PCS fraction activity

Mark Serwotka, socialist, elected General Secretary: Victory!

Coverage from Action for Solidarity, 8 December 2000

Union has voted for change

MY 40,000 votes are more than any left candidate has ever got in the Civil Service, and three times more than the mandate for current National Executive Committee members. They were won on a very clear programme and policy on the issues directly affecting members, such as pay and privatisation. Tens of thousands of members have agreed that we need a union different from the one we've had.

It is essential now that the left unites around the policies that brought this victory and looks ahead to the National Executive Committee elections in 2002. But clearly we can't just wait for those elections. We need to build a real campaign among branches and members around the key policies.

There is, of course, a wider political significance to this victory. The Government must take note -- particularly and immediately in relation to the Air Traffic Control service - that I oppose privatisation. They should reconsider now. PCS members have voted against privatisation.

PCS members will now be able to see a leadership in the public eye, commenting and campaigning on issues like low pay.

Left wins in PCS election

By Charlie McDonald, Secretary, PCS DSS East London

Mark Serwotka has beaten Blairite bureaucrat Hugh Lanning by 40,740 votes to 33,942 for the top position of General Secretary in the 250,000-strong civil service union PCS.

The lesson for the left in the unions is clear: when we offer a clear lead on the issues of most importance to members, we can win.

Mark stood on a platform which included: national rates of pay; an end to performance-related pay; members to reach their maximum pay rate within five years; more annual leave; cutting the working week to 35 hours; a national campaign against all forms of privatisation; more union democracy.

This programme - coupled with the fact that Mark is a serving civil servant in the Benefits Agency who has said that he will not take the General Secretary's salary of £70,000 but have his wage linked to that of the average member - has struck a chord with thousands of members across the Civil Service.

Mark's campaign, organised by PCS Must Fight Back, was won on a shoestring. We were able to do it because we had the right message and fought on the issues - as opposed to the usual factional politics we get in PCS elections which, unsurprisingly, leave members cold.

This fantastic result gives an indication of what could be achieved should the union put its full resources into campaigning for improvements to our members' living standards. Mark's vote shows that the support is there for such a campaign.

We should be proud of what we have achieved. This is an absolutely marvellous result and a step forward for the union and its members. But we should not sit on our laurels. We need now to start taking up the themes of the campaign, which have been endorsed by many PCS members, and building as wide a base of support as possible within the union. We also need to be looking forward to the National Executive elections in 2002.

In doing so we need to examine the role of the "official" broad left in PCS, Left Unity, and in particular Socialist Party supporters, who have played a despicable role. They originally advocated supporting Lanning to keep out another, worse, Blairite, Barry Reamsbottom - claiming that "a sober socialist analysis of the objective political conditions shows that a socialist cannot win in this election".

When Reamsbottom failed to get enough nominations to get onto the ballot paper, the Socialist Party called on Mark to stand down from the election! Some of their supporters refused to distribute PCS Must Fight Back literature in their branches, claiming that Mark was not a "credible candidate" but a maverick!

In order to carry out Mark's election promises we need to build on the success of the campaign. We need to keep our supporters together in broad-based campaigns that will start to rebuild the union from the grassroots up. We also need to start getting other branches involved, and we need to start reaching out to Left Unity activists who are unhappy with the way their leadership has so badly handled this election.

We have won the General Secretary's position - now let's build a movement of members that can transform the union!