Unite if you want to…
So Unite it is then - Christine Buckley has the scoop in the Times that it’s the least worst name for the new union. I didn’t think it was even one of the front runners for the name, but I think it fits the bill pretty well.
You may think ‘what’s in a name?’, but I reckon it’s pretty crucial to get right if the union is going to reach out beyond it’s traditional membership - something which is pretty much the last big hope for the growth of the UK union movement.
The name needs to work well on an aspirational basis - all the millions of professional and clerical people in new economy jobs, who are looking for a union, even if they don’t know it or know the first thing about unions (natural recruiting territory for Amicus).
But it also needs to be an immediate and clear statement that it is here to help people sort out workplace problems together, to fit well with the work started by the T&G, aiming at the other big non-union sector of vulnerable workers - the low pay, low conditions jobs that have traditionally slipped through the union net.
Unite seems to be a name that could work well in communications to both groups - fingers crossed now that the visual identity for it comes out in the same way, rather than leaning too much to one side, and risking alienating the other group.
It’s a bit similar to Unity mebbe, and there may be confusions on their planned international focus if they take up joint working with UNITE-HERE in the States. There’s a potential gift to mickey-takers with the name ‘Untie’, but it’s an old joke after it was done so effectively to United Airlines.
Least worst or not, I think you couldn’t have got better with a whole union of focus groups - good luck to them in making it fit the new organisation.
