TRADE unionists have unanimously voted in favour of establishing a Mendip Trades Union Council, which will cover Frome.
Secretary for the Somerset Association of Trades Union Councils, Dave Chapple said, “Very happy to report that this month, mid-Somerset trades unionists at the Lawrence Centre in Wells, following an earlier meeting in Frome, voted unanimously to establish a Mendip Trades Union Council.
“Twenty trades unionists from Cheddar, Wells, Glastonbury, Street, Shepton Mallet, Frome, Bruton and Paulton, representing Unite, UNISON, UCU, NEU(NUT), NEU (ATL), USDAW and PCS unions, have responded to an appeal from myself, that a new trades council for central Somerset was essential if working-class activists were ever going to speak and act with one voice, across a huge area of countryside and small towns dominated for decades, if not centuries, by conservative and employer interests.
Mendip Trades Union Council, together with existing councils in Bath, Weston/North Somerset; Bridgwater; Taunton/West Somerset; and Yeovil, completes the final and largest piece in the jigsaw of county-wide trade union organisation and solidarity.
“Officers elected on a temporary basis pending the first AGM of the new council were Chair, Robin Head, a Somerset teacher, NEU(NUT) organiser and national executive member; Secretary, Bevis Miller, retired university lecturer and UCU activist; Treasurer, Deborah Towner, Shepton Mallet supermarket worker and USDAW Branch Secretary.
Meetings will be held in different Mendip towns over the coming months, including Frome and (with Bath TUC) Radstock.
“Trades unionists in a rural county like Somerset have to be tough and they have to be resilient. Decades of factory closures, privatisation of public services, and the growth of anti-union employers, have left their scars. However, this brand new organisation, campaigning not just on workplace issues but all those affecting Somerset’s working-class community, will, I believe, prove to be a force for good, and I hope that all trades union activists and community campaigners against Tory cuts to wages, services and welfare, will get in touch!”
For further information contact Dave Chapple on 07707 869 144, or email: davechapple@btinternet.com
