The working class needs its own party, unions must lead
Editorial of the Socialist issue 1372
Reform UK leader Nigel Farage has invited trade unions to affiliate to his party in a video posted on X (formerly Twitter), and in an interview with the Times newspaper.
The video refers to a poll of around 1,000 trade union members for the Times, which showed support for Labour and Reform tied. ‘If there were a general election tomorrow’, Reform wins out over Labour in Unite, GMB and UCU.
“Damning but not surprising”, is how Sharon Graham, leader of Labour-affiliated union Unite described the figures, correctly adding: “Labour has abandoned the working class, and now the working class has abandoned Labour.”
Andrea Egan, leader of Labour-affiliated, public-sector union Unison, said: “It’s a con to think Nigel Farage and his rich cronies are interested in unions for anything but cold hard cash.” Hardly a convincing argument to the 25% of her membership who said they would vote for Reform tomorrow. Many of them and more would argue that Labour affiliation feels like a con too!
What does union affiliation to Labour achieve for members? For years, Unison and Unite members in Labour-run local authorities have faced brutal austerity and job losses. Despite the fact that national bodies in both unions have policies for councils to set no-cuts budgets.
Labour in power
The experience of Labour carrying out austerity locally, and now Keir Starmer’s government’s attacks on workers, is what has prepared the ground for Farage’s Reform. Undoubtedly, workers in Reform-led councils will fear for a further ratcheting up of cutbacks and job losses. After May’s elections, Reform now has full control of 23 councils, and there are 11 others it leads with no overall control. Clearly there is the danger of those numbers increasing next May, when around 7,000 seats are up.
The trade unions need to prepare now for how to use their influence to cut across support for Reform. And, as the May 2026 elections showed, simply arguing to continue to back Labour or risk getting Reform won’t work. That’s why Socialist Party members are raising the demand in the trade unions for a cross-union conference to discuss what kind of political representation the working class needs in those elections, which has the ability to cut across support for Reform. It could discuss the trade unions standing their own candidates.
A duplicitous offer
Of course, Farage’s invite is not an offer for trade unions to have democratic control over its councils’ policies. However, that is also not how Labour councils operate. Unfortunately, the same is also true of the Greens, to which some trade unionists will inevitably look to in search of political representation too.
Why then has Farage used one side of his mouth to launch a charm offensive towards trade union members? It is true that, as Farage says in his video, “Reform’s voter base is working people”. The same is true for any capitalist party which achieves electoral success – the working class is the overwhelming majority in society, and the trade unions have nearly 7 million members.
To speak to an audience with a broad section of workers, however, why would Farage choose an interview with the Times, behind an online paywall?
Farage’s charm offensive is in fact also aimed at a section of the capitalist class who correctly fear that a future Reform government would provoke huge struggles of workers and young people. “Unlike the snobbish Tories of old”, Farage tells the Times, “we will never treat organised labour with contempt”. Read: ‘My intention is not to provoke the biggest wave of strikes in a generation like the Tories did’. Let’s see about that!
For the capitalists, the biggest benefit of a Labour government is the fact that it has the trade union leaders using their authority to try to shield the government from workers’ anger. There will be hopes from sections of the capitalist class that expectations on a new Labour leader – for example in the form of Andy Burnham, whose place in parliament will only be known after the Socialist goes to press – can shore up that shield for a bit longer.
Their dilemma of course, is that those expectations, and any concessions given to allow those expectations to get a bit more purchase, can also increase the appetite and confidence among workers to struggle for more.
Starmer’s woes
The most recent resignation from Starmer’s cabinet of John Healey from his position as defence secretary is evidence of the government’s weakness and also of the pressures that will continue to exert themselves on the government, whoever heads it. Healey wanted more money for military spending and cuts elsewhere to pay for it. A leak to the Sunday Times suggested slashing net-zero spending and a 1% capital spending cut across government departments was being considered. Starmer’s government is too weak to get away with that, and his successor is likely to be too weak too.
Sections of the capitalists would prefer a figure like Farage to get the dirty work over with. The pensions triple lock and disability benefits are at the top of the chopping list. Executing those attacks on the working class is not a recipe for stability, or for maintaining the lie of being ‘for working people’.
Maintaining a base of support amongst the working-class electorate while also carrying out the austerity measures the capitalist system in crisis demands is an almost unmanageable and unending task, as recent experience of Tory and Labour governments proves. Political stability is a thing of the past.
New waves of workers’ struggles are inevitable and, as always, will involve those who today are intending to vote for the likes of Reform tomorrow. A trade union-led struggle against Labour austerity, starting with a national demo in the autumn to coincide with a rash of pay ballots across the public sector unions – would be the start of what is needed to cut across support for Farage and the right in our movement and across the working class.
