OPINION:Union votes on changes in conditions of work can seem democratic while steamrolling minorities who are directly affected, writes PETER MacMENAMIN
AT ALL times, democracy is a very delicate and sensitive concept. This is particularly true in industrial relations. The normal principle of “majority rule” doesn’t and shouldn’t always apply; it is easy to fall into the trap of the tyranny of the majority, whereby a majority can steamroll over a minority, thereby ignoring the legitimate interests of that minority. This is not democracy, which should always be judged by how it deals with legitimate minority interests.
A clear example of this tyranny would be where a pay offer was made to 100 workers whereby 60 were to get a pay rise, at the expense of 40 who were to suffer a pay cut. The 60 would outvote the 40 if they looked at the proposal in a selfish manner, looking only at how it affected them. This is tyranny of the majority in action.
It seems that some senior trade union leaders fell into the trap of tyranny of the majority recently in addressing the overall outcome of the proposed Public Service Agreement, when they suggested that it would be a majority rule at the end of the process.
They suggested that the proposed Public Service Agreement be decided by a vote of unions at the Public Services Committee of Irish Congress of Trade Unkons (Ictu).
On first look this all seems very democratic, particularly when each union has a voting strength at the committee related to its size. But this is not so.
Let’s consider one of the minority groups – teachers, who have recently reacted very strongly against the proposals.
As part of the proposals, teachers would be required to work an extra hour – an idea described in an editorial in a national newspaper as an insult to the great majority of teachers, who work very long hours for their students.
In addition, teachers are being asked to agree to have their contracts renegotiated, without any idea as to what changes might be brought into these contracts. The question immediately is, why should any group other than teachers decide on the acceptability of this proposal in this situation?
Similarly, some workers in the health services are being asked to spread their normal working day to any time between 8am and 8pm, and to work over any five days of the week, weekends included. It is not the right of any group other than health service workers to decide on the acceptability of this proposal.
It has been said that in the past, majority rule is the way it was always done for this type of agreement. Even if it were true, this, on its own, is a very dangerous argument. If we never learned from the errors of history, we would throw out all equality legislation because at one time, earlier ways of doing things were “the way it was always done”. Apartheid would be okay, as would capital punishment for minor crimes. We must evolve our thinking and decide what is right or wrong on the merits of the issue, judged in today’s terms.
But was deciding on agreements of this nature always done this way in the past?
Pre-1987 public service pay agreements were just that – agreements to do with pay which did not involve changes in conditions of service for workers. They were quite appropriately decided by the majority-rule principle by workers across the public sector. Since 1987, governments and the social partners, including trade unions, have engaged in negotiations on social policy issues that resulted in a social partnership agreement. The first social partnership agreement was the Programme for National Recovery in 1987, and since then there have been seven agreements. The first five did not directly affect conditions of service and were, again, I believe, appropriately, decided on a majority-rule basis.
A variation of this was the Programme for Competitiveness and Work (PCW) in which, as an alternative to a straight pay increase for groups of workers, there was a local bargaining clause in which changes in work practices could be negotiated in return for greater pay increases.
These agreements were outside of the main agreement and were exclusively decided on by the workers to whom the proposals applied.
The last two social partnership agreements, Sustaining Progress (2003-2005) and Towards 2016 (2006-2015), have imposed changes in conditions on individual minority groups of public service workers. These changes were written into the main proposals and as such were voted on by workers in all unions, whether the agreements applied to them or not.
They were then adopted on a majority-rule basis by a special delegate conference of Ictu, minority views being suppressed. The TUI believed this was entirely inappropriate, and tabled the following motion at the Ictu biennial congress in 2003: “This conference respects the integrity of each union or group of unions in both the negotiation of the conditions of service of their members and the decision-making process in relation to any such negotiation. This conference directs the Executive Council to respect these principles in any future negotiations towards any proposed national agreements, and to utilise approaches such as the local bargaining clause in the PCW in order to implement such principles.”
This motion was carried. It determines that only the workers concerned in changes of conditions of service would decide on the acceptability of those changes if they are in return for pay rises; for example that teachers should decide on teachers’ issues, and health workers should decide on their issues, etc. This position is now Ictu policy, and it is a policy that must be adhered to – even if it is inconvenient.
It certainly appears that this policy was being ignored recently when several union leaders pronounced on the majority-rule principle, presumably doing so in the belief that only a few extremists would take the view that the current proposals were unacceptable, and that the tyranny of the majority could be brought into play to crush this minority and leave them isolated. This is not in accordance with good trade union principles.
Ictu sees itself as a democratic organisation, dedicated to the protection of the rights of all, including minorities. It wishes to bring about greater unity within the affiliate unions. This is surely brought about by adherence to policies democratically developed – and not by talking about majority rule regarding such a sensitive proposal, which affects different workers differently.
Peter MacMenamin is general secretary of the Teachers’ Union of Ireland (TUI)