UNISON Target is 100%

Public services union UNISON has launched a major recruitment drive in what general secretary Dave Prentis described as “the most traumatic time in the union’s history”.

The union says 270,000 jobs have been lost in the past 15 months in areas where it organises, and that people need the support of the union more than ever. “But at the same time, there are large pockets of people who have never joined a union.”

The campaign was launched with TV and newspaper advertising and new recruitment materials have provided for branches to use in local activity.

The campaign is concentrating on workplaces where the union already has a strong presence – and activists have easy access – but where there are also large numbers of non-members. Prentis said: “In many workplaces we’re 50% unionised. We should be 100% unionised.”

Nearly 300 new organisers have been recruited, paid for by a fighting fund that was set up by the union’s national executive committee “to support branches in their hour of need”.