New leader pledges fight for ‘good jobs’

The newly-elected leader of the GMB general union, Gary Smith, told his union’s annual congress, held online last month, that the union would fight for “good jobs and proper pay, to achieve pay justice for working women”, and to reduce the cost of being a GMB member.

He also promised to face up to the union’s financial problems and to implement in full — “no ifs, no buts” — the recommendations of the Monaghan Report, which found the union to be “institutionally sexist”.

Smith, the former regional officer for Scotland, took around 50% of the vote in the three-cornered contest in the TUC’s third largest union.

National secretary Rehana Azam came second, while Giovanna Holt, senior organiser in the North West and Irish region, came in third place.

Referring to the union’s financial problems, Smith told congress delegates: “Over the last five years we have been steadily losing our financial membership, a failure that has put the long-term future of the union in a precarious position ... we cannot keep turning up the dial on our existing membership — union dues need to be more affordable, not more expensive.”

Turning to the Monaghan report, he criticised “others in our union” who have “lost sight of their own power and responsibility”. And he pledged to implement all the report’s recommendations in full.