McCluskey and Scargill, brothers, comrades, in arms. Other peoples money for their own political ends, never once looking in the rear view mirror at the trail of wreckage strewn in their wake.
Last edited 2 years ago by Tom Lewis
Jon Redman
2 years ago
McCluskey is about as sorry for it as for lying about that broken arm
…which neatly encapsulates a key point about this revolting man and his revolting party. The reason Labour won’t say sorry for wrecking pensions, or wrecking the housing market, or for mass immigration, or its anti-Semitism, or for causing the world financial crash, is because they are not sorry at all.
Indeed, that was my reaction. I dislike McGhastly (arrogant, venal, destructive self regarding charlatan) intensely and I have no liking at all for the Labour party but to assert they caused the global financial crash is frankly risible as well as being historically and economically illiterate.
I’m sure good Mr Redman was just larking around. I noticed he has a sharp understanding of the property market & the recent effects of stamp duty changes for example – he’s definitely not economically illiterate. But you’re right on the broad points. While it would be a over simplification to say Labour saved the world from the 2008 crash, Gordon Brown did that more than any other single individual, with his leadership of the G20 & in coordinating the global Keynesian resurgence. If any doubt this, then check out “Beyond the Crash: Overcoming the First Crisis of Globalisation by Gordon Brown: review” by leading conservative journalist Peter Oborne. While mostly critical of GB, Oborne heaps praise on Mr Brown for his global leadership in the aftermath of the Lehman collapse. There’s been some first class conservatives in recent years, such as John Major. But one would have to look as far back as Super Mac to find any Tory who could remotely be compared with the talent of a Gordon Brown or a Tony Blair.
Well I hope you are right! I enjoy Unherd but there are times when some of the comments on here are reactionary on a level with Louis XIV.
I agree with your analysis – as many of us know the sub-prime mortgage expansion in America was the root cause. It started under |clinton but expanded greatly under Bush and the repeal of Glass-Steagal was a major error. As for New Labour they were under the spell of deregulation which was also a factor.
That great Progressive conservative Theodore Roosevelt believed in markets but regulated ones…
Gordon Brown played as big a part in inflating the pre-crash asset bubble and living off its tax proceeds as he did in saving the world when it blew up. He cancelled himself out.
The origins of the crash go back well before Gordon Brown – in fact as far as `1989 when there was a move in the USA to stop banks “redlining” poor areas; the thinking was to “de-ghettoise” America. This became more acute after the 2001 recession. It seems also that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac underwrote all this. Derivative products increased markedly after 2001 and interest rates were lowered accordingly. This was initially an American problem. Gordon Brown deregulating and increasing spending after 2001 exacerbated it. He is not blameless but he did not cause it.
You seem to have your microscope upside down. Gordon Brown as saviour of the world and leader of the G20? I don’t think so. The talent of Supermac? At grouse shooting perhaps. John Major as a first class Conservative?
Ah got it, you are being bitingly satirical. Yes, very good!
Actually no. Broon caused the crash and the recovery was to the credit of the 2010-2015 coalition and its successor governments, to whom he handed the bill for his “solution”. He is beyond any shadow of a doubt the worst chancellor and PM we have ever had, and even if you back to that fool who paid the Danegeld you still won’t find one worse or who did more damage.
This is what Labour does: maxes out the national credit card, bankrupts the country, then bellyaches from the opposition benches about “Tory cuts” because nothing they spend is ever paid for.
If you gave me your Amex card I could probably have a Ferrari delivered to your door, but I wouldn’t expect thanks or applaud myself unless I was also going to pay your Amex bill. If I were any Labour chancellor ever, I’d hand you the bill then tell you how wicked you are for not voting for more of the same.
Every single thing Labour claims to have accomplished between 1997 and 2010 was funded by debt they let their successors try to find a way to pay. They are utter, utter vermin.
Yes, absolutely. Labour destroyed an effective UK financial regulatory regime and replaced it with an entirely ineffective one. This made London a magnet for financial services firms who wanted to be regulated badly, because it’s cheap, allows excessive risk taking and enables greater profits. Greater profits provided Labour with more tax revenue to pi55 up the wall like a drunken sailor. Labour is a party of lawyers, polytechnic lecturers, grievance industry twerps and trade union muppets, so had no more understanding of what it was doing than a chimpanzee has of brain surgery.
The damage to New York and other financial centres was so severe that it created a race to the bottom, with other countries but notably the US deliberately making regulation less effective to support the national position as a financial centre.
The resulting collapse of nearly 600 financial institutions was wholly because they were ineffectively supervised, which happened because Labour made it so. Labour is entirely to blame for the crash.
Perhaps the word “faith” in your comment should be replaced by the word “delusion”. Surely McCluskey’s book proves that there is no such thing as caring, sharing, left wing politics?
You did say “anyone who wishes to retain any faith” in such matters. There was no clear indication that you were one such yourself. So I think your statement is just fine as it is.
It’s hard to disagree. The left have always been pedlars of hate; all that changes is whom they hate from one moment to the next.
Francis MacGabhann
2 years ago
At one time, I would have defended someone like McCluskey on the old “The Tories are Worse” principle. I’m ashamed it took me decades to figure out that it doesn’t work that way, and besides, it’s not actually true. McCluskey is the walking embodiment of the reasons I gave up on socialism. When I did, it was like waking from a coma. I strongly urge anyone reading who still considers themselves a leftist to just try a thought experiment — go a day considering yourself a conservative (and note here the small “c”; the Tories haven’t been conservative for decades) and try looking at the world and its faults through that lens. You don’t have to tell anyone else you’re doing it. Just try it privately, commit to it full force, and see what you can see. You may be shocked.
Thanks. I’ve just checked it out on Amazon and I’m definitely going to buy it after reading this: In intellectual circles…conservatives move quietly and discreetly, catching each others eyes across the room like the homosexuals in Proust, whom that great writer compared to Homer’s gods, known only to each other as they move in disguise around the world of mortals. I’m still rocking with laughter.
Francis MacGabhann, I had a similar “road to Damascus” experience in 1965 after hearing Clive Jenkins address the Cambridge University Labour Club, of which I confess I was a member at that time. His vindictive, destructive brand of levelling everything down so that he and his mates could rise to the top put me off left-wing politics almost instantly. As you say, it’s like waking from a coma when the realisation dawns. I have since become a proud floating voter, not a tribal cipher. Would that Labour could become a sensible opposition – not for the foreseeable future, which leaves the Boris Circus a clear run for now.
Seconded. It’s an excellent and eye-opening piece of work.
Sir Roger Scruton was a (much maligned but) decent man who was everything his left-wing critics are not – honest, brave, cultured and worthy of respect.
Andrew Richardson
2 years ago
I’m a therapist and had a client, who was a businessman in the building industry. He knew the union leaders in the industry. His picture of them is exactly as you describe McCluskey. They were like maffia bosses offering protection… or else. Utterly without principle and rather sordid individuals.
The skilled unions AEU and EETPU produced Bill Jordon, Gavin Laird, Hammond( supported Blair) and Chapple, very different people. These men were reasonable and represented craftsmen.
The un and semi skilled unions, especially the dockers were very different, the exception being Ernie Bevin. The Liverpook dockers could be the best in the World at loading and unloading difficult cargo or they could produce Mcluskeys. Since the 1970s, the obnoxious Hatton types have come to dominate the Labour Party politics of Liverpool. The late Eric Heffer, a MP for Liverpool said the problem was that the City lacked skilled employment in manufacturing ; it was commercial or dockyad. Once the commercial – ship owning and building, broking, insurance, legal, banking work related to shipping and cotton left, employment became dominated by un-skilled dock work; hence McCluskey . The miners up to Joe Gormley were reasonable until Scargill.
The Construction News often used to have articles on dubious if not fraudulent union elections. The construction industry used to employ many un and semi-skilled people and if they were in unions, the shop stewards often were promoted by being awkward. Construction companies which employed Foremen and Site Managers who were physically tough ( ex boxers, rugby league players, ex Forces ) and ex shop stewards survived, those who did not, often went bust due to strikes.
In the 1960s Dennis Healey was Deputy Leader of the Labour Party today we have Angela Rayner which shows the changes .
Nicholas Rynn
2 years ago
The Worker’s Flag is Deepest Pink
Its not as red as you might think
And ever forward as we go
It soon will be as white as snow
So raise the banner, not too high
We’re much too young to do or die
Before the Party liquidates
We’ll all be Labour candidates
Last edited 2 years ago by Nicholas Rynn
Malcolm Knott
2 years ago
Given his admission of having made a fraudulent claim is there any reason why McCluskey should not be prosecuted?
“No court in this land will allow a person to keep an advantage which he has obtained by fraud. No judgment of a court, no order of a Minister, can be allowed to stand if it has been obtained by fraud. Fraud unravels everything. The court is careful not to find fraud unless it is distinctly pleaded and proved; but once it is proved, it vitiates judgments, contracts and all transactions whatsoever…”
Per Denning LJ in Lazarus Estates Ltd -v- Beasley [1956] 1 QB 702
Unfortunately, our laws in statute of limitations allow some crimes to go unpunished. Murder is the only exception I’m aware of. (USA)
hugh bennett
2 years ago
Well, I enjoyed the read, but now.. what can I really say about the total charlatan it exposes that would not be censored !? Better to tell an old joke –
Three hard working people and a Union Leader were discussing how clever their dogs were.
The first was an aircraft engineer who said his dog could do maths calculations. His dog was named T-square. He told the dog to get some paper and draw a square, a circle, and a triangle which the dog did with finesse.
The second person was an accountant who said she thought her dog was better. Her dog was called Calculator. She told the dog to fetch a dozen cookies, bring them back, and divide them into piles of three, which the dog did with ease.
The third, a chemist, said that his dog could do even better. He told his dog, named Measure, to get a pint of milk and pour half a pint into a glass. The dog did this immediately.
All three agreed that the three dogs were incredible and equally smart.
Then they all turned to the Union Leader and said, “what can your dog do” ?
The Union Leader whistled for his dog, who was named Coffee Break, and said, “show my fellow workers what you can do”.
Coffee Break promptly ate the cookies, drank the milk, s–t on the paper, sc–ed the other three dogs, claimed he had injured his back while doing so, filed a grievance for unsafe work conditions, applied for work-dog’s compensation and was driven back to his kennel, in his master`s limousine, on sick leave…..
Last edited 2 years ago by hugh bennett
Paul Hughes
2 years ago
The broken arm story and his satisfaction at the success of his lies and perverting justice – if not actually perjury, assuming he took or signed an oath or declaration that his account was the truth – tells us everything about the man we need to know.
MJ Reid
2 years ago
As a member of Unite (and the TGWU before) I initially supported Mcuskey for General Secretary. But unfortunately power corrupts absolutely. I knew the man personally and had to tell him in the not so distant past, that if he was on fire, I would have to keep my urine for a much more deserving soul. He was not amused.
He stayed too long. He was corrupt. He was happy to keep up the “jobs for the boys” policy of previous GS. And as for the Karie Murphy debacle, he was happy to railroad genuine socialists to get uis own way.
The man is not someone to look up to and now he has gone, just maybe Unite can be the Union its lay members want it to be.
Simon Hodgson
2 years ago
Or “The Man who made and enabled Johnson” which is what McCluskey did with his support for Corbyn.
Strange that those on the left still cannot see this, just as in the US the support for Hilary Clinton in 2016 almost certainly enabled Trump to be elected.
Hanging onto Biden is likely to lead to a second Trump victory or Harris taking over. She would almost certainly would never have stood any chance of formal election to President.
Then there is the fact that the 22nd Amendment has never been tested in law.
Robert Kaye
2 years ago
There’s no statute of limitations for fraud…
Will R
2 years ago
I’ve always had a vague distrust of the power of, and misused by, the big union capos, the lack of transparency and accountability, questioning their real motives & objectives Thanks to your article I now understand more clearly. Thanks
Albireo Double
2 years ago
This man is pure evil.
Until he, and all who think like him are gone from public life, the political left will remain tainted and sour, completely unelectable – unfit for government or opposition, and therefore continuing to poison UK politics and public life.
The only input people like this offer is negative and toxic.
Prashant Kotak
2 years ago
Fantastic hatchet job, I love it, and I imagine JK will *not* be on the McCluskey Christmas list this year.
Martin Le Jeune
2 years ago
Superb analysis – thanks James Kirkup
Gerard McGlynn
2 years ago
As far as I am aware there is no statute of limitation for the criminal fraud perpetrated by this gentleman. Who would like to nip round to the local nick and report him ?
Kevin Milligan
2 years ago
Power tends to corrupt, although it may not have had much of a job to do here. Some of the comments though hint at a deep fear/dislike of working people.
Depends on the argument. I get the impression that labour was anti globalist back in the day, pre Blair. I’d say a bigger argument was lost by the free trade will rise all boats, a rising middle class will overthrow authoritarian rule in China and other places. If China is a threat now, it’s because of globalisation.
Martin Smith
2 years ago
“At least Corbyn was consistent in his principles…” Apart from his Bennite opposition to the undemocratic and anti- working class EU. The one principle, had he stuck to it, that might very well have prospered his leadership… oh well.
Franz Von Peppercorn
2 years ago
UnHerd is a broad church of ideologies. However the whole partisan nonsense, the Corbyn hatred, is redolent of the telegraph and if I wanted to subscribe there I would.
A quick google of the writers profile and he is a member of the social market foundation, a think tank that supported new labour, was John Major’s favourite think tank and is probably on the Cameron end of the Tory party. Given that reality the partisan response here is amusing.
In other words it’s the policy of supposed centrism, the one that got us into this mess.
So what… even if one granted all that you say …Len McCluskey is still a nasty piece of work isn`t he?
Henry Reed
1 year ago
New levels of Orwellian manipulation from Unherd there. The cliche that “Labour has become middle class” is usually centred on cultural issues – trans rights and so on. Yet here they’re bizarrely trying to lump in TRADE UNION ACTIVISM with that complaint! “Don’t stand up for workers’ rights because that makes you into [checks notes] a middle class lefty idiot who’s abandoned the working class!”
McCluskey and Scargill, brothers, comrades, in arms. Other peoples money for their own political ends, never once looking in the rear view mirror at the trail of wreckage strewn in their wake.
…which neatly encapsulates a key point about this revolting man and his revolting party. The reason Labour won’t say sorry for wrecking pensions, or wrecking the housing market, or for mass immigration, or its anti-Semitism, or for causing the world financial crash, is because they are not sorry at all.
Labour causing “the world’s financial crash” ?
Indeed, that was my reaction. I dislike McGhastly (arrogant, venal, destructive self regarding charlatan) intensely and I have no liking at all for the Labour party but to assert they caused the global financial crash is frankly risible as well as being historically and economically illiterate.
I’m sure good Mr Redman was just larking around. I noticed he has a sharp understanding of the property market & the recent effects of stamp duty changes for example – he’s definitely not economically illiterate. But you’re right on the broad points. While it would be a over simplification to say Labour saved the world from the 2008 crash, Gordon Brown did that more than any other single individual, with his leadership of the G20 & in coordinating the global Keynesian resurgence. If any doubt this, then check out “Beyond the Crash: Overcoming the First Crisis of Globalisation by Gordon Brown: review” by leading conservative journalist Peter Oborne. While mostly critical of GB, Oborne heaps praise on Mr Brown for his global leadership in the aftermath of the Lehman collapse. There’s been some first class conservatives in recent years, such as John Major. But one would have to look as far back as Super Mac to find any Tory who could remotely be compared with the talent of a Gordon Brown or a Tony Blair.
Well I hope you are right! I enjoy Unherd but there are times when some of the comments on here are reactionary on a level with Louis XIV.
I agree with your analysis – as many of us know the sub-prime mortgage expansion in America was the root cause. It started under |clinton but expanded greatly under Bush and the repeal of Glass-Steagal was a major error. As for New Labour they were under the spell of deregulation which was also a factor.
That great Progressive conservative Theodore Roosevelt believed in markets but regulated ones…
Gordon Brown played as big a part in inflating the pre-crash asset bubble and living off its tax proceeds as he did in saving the world when it blew up. He cancelled himself out.
The origins of the crash go back well before Gordon Brown – in fact as far as `1989 when there was a move in the USA to stop banks “redlining” poor areas; the thinking was to “de-ghettoise” America. This became more acute after the 2001 recession. It seems also that Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac underwrote all this. Derivative products increased markedly after 2001 and interest rates were lowered accordingly. This was initially an American problem. Gordon Brown deregulating and increasing spending after 2001 exacerbated it. He is not blameless but he did not cause it.
You seem to have your microscope upside down. Gordon Brown as saviour of the world and leader of the G20? I don’t think so. The talent of Supermac? At grouse shooting perhaps. John Major as a first class Conservative?
Ah got it, you are being bitingly satirical. Yes, very good!
Actually no. Broon caused the crash and the recovery was to the credit of the 2010-2015 coalition and its successor governments, to whom he handed the bill for his “solution”. He is beyond any shadow of a doubt the worst chancellor and PM we have ever had, and even if you back to that fool who paid the Danegeld you still won’t find one worse or who did more damage.
This is what Labour does: maxes out the national credit card, bankrupts the country, then bellyaches from the opposition benches about “Tory cuts” because nothing they spend is ever paid for.
If you gave me your Amex card I could probably have a Ferrari delivered to your door, but I wouldn’t expect thanks or applaud myself unless I was also going to pay your Amex bill. If I were any Labour chancellor ever, I’d hand you the bill then tell you how wicked you are for not voting for more of the same.
Every single thing Labour claims to have accomplished between 1997 and 2010 was funded by debt they let their successors try to find a way to pay. They are utter, utter vermin.
I’m not even sure how labour wrecked pensions. Or why they are more or less responsible for mass immigration than the conservatives.
Yes, absolutely. Labour destroyed an effective UK financial regulatory regime and replaced it with an entirely ineffective one. This made London a magnet for financial services firms who wanted to be regulated badly, because it’s cheap, allows excessive risk taking and enables greater profits. Greater profits provided Labour with more tax revenue to pi55 up the wall like a drunken sailor. Labour is a party of lawyers, polytechnic lecturers, grievance industry twerps and trade union muppets, so had no more understanding of what it was doing than a chimpanzee has of brain surgery.
The damage to New York and other financial centres was so severe that it created a race to the bottom, with other countries but notably the US deliberately making regulation less effective to support the national position as a financial centre.
The resulting collapse of nearly 600 financial institutions was wholly because they were ineffectively supervised, which happened because Labour made it so. Labour is entirely to blame for the crash.
Right. So the US followed the lead of Tony Blair’s government on financial deregulation, is that the claim?
Len McCluskey’s memoir, “Always Red” should be “Never Read” by anyone who wishes to retain any faith in caring, sharing, left wing politics.
Perhaps the word “faith” in your comment should be replaced by the word “delusion”. Surely McCluskey’s book proves that there is no such thing as caring, sharing, left wing politics?
Quite – I was being sarcastic, so probably should have put “caring, sharing” in quotes. Perhaps pages like these need an irony emoji we can employ
You did say “anyone who wishes to retain any faith” in such matters. There was no clear indication that you were one such yourself. So I think your statement is just fine as it is.
The irony being those that recognise it will appreciate it. Need I continue?
It’s hard to disagree. The left have always been pedlars of hate; all that changes is whom they hate from one moment to the next.
At one time, I would have defended someone like McCluskey on the old “The Tories are Worse” principle. I’m ashamed it took me decades to figure out that it doesn’t work that way, and besides, it’s not actually true. McCluskey is the walking embodiment of the reasons I gave up on socialism. When I did, it was like waking from a coma. I strongly urge anyone reading who still considers themselves a leftist to just try a thought experiment — go a day considering yourself a conservative (and note here the small “c”; the Tories haven’t been conservative for decades) and try looking at the world and its faults through that lens. You don’t have to tell anyone else you’re doing it. Just try it privately, commit to it full force, and see what you can see. You may be shocked.
Thanks. I’ve just checked it out on Amazon and I’m definitely going to buy it after reading this: In intellectual circles…conservatives move quietly and discreetly, catching each others eyes across the room like the homosexuals in Proust, whom that great writer compared to Homer’s gods, known only to each other as they move in disguise around the world of mortals. I’m still rocking with laughter.
Francis MacGabhann, I had a similar “road to Damascus” experience in 1965 after hearing Clive Jenkins address the Cambridge University Labour Club, of which I confess I was a member at that time. His vindictive, destructive brand of levelling everything down so that he and his mates could rise to the top put me off left-wing politics almost instantly. As you say, it’s like waking from a coma when the realisation dawns. I have since become a proud floating voter, not a tribal cipher. Would that Labour could become a sensible opposition – not for the foreseeable future, which leaves the Boris Circus a clear run for now.
It won’t work. Most people don’t know what conservatism is.
Seconded. It’s an excellent and eye-opening piece of work.
Sir Roger Scruton was a (much maligned but) decent man who was everything his left-wing critics are not – honest, brave, cultured and worthy of respect.
I’m a therapist and had a client, who was a businessman in the building industry. He knew the union leaders in the industry. His picture of them is exactly as you describe McCluskey. They were like maffia bosses offering protection… or else. Utterly without principle and rather sordid individuals.
The skilled unions AEU and EETPU produced Bill Jordon, Gavin Laird, Hammond( supported Blair) and Chapple, very different people. These men were reasonable and represented craftsmen.
The un and semi skilled unions, especially the dockers were very different, the exception being Ernie Bevin. The Liverpook dockers could be the best in the World at loading and unloading difficult cargo or they could produce Mcluskeys. Since the 1970s, the obnoxious Hatton types have come to dominate the Labour Party politics of Liverpool. The late Eric Heffer, a MP for Liverpool said the problem was that the City lacked skilled employment in manufacturing ; it was commercial or dockyad. Once the commercial – ship owning and building, broking, insurance, legal, banking work related to shipping and cotton left, employment became dominated by un-skilled dock work; hence McCluskey . The miners up to Joe Gormley were reasonable until Scargill.
The Construction News often used to have articles on dubious if not fraudulent union elections. The construction industry used to employ many un and semi-skilled people and if they were in unions, the shop stewards often were promoted by being awkward. Construction companies which employed Foremen and Site Managers who were physically tough ( ex boxers, rugby league players, ex Forces ) and ex shop stewards survived, those who did not, often went bust due to strikes.
In the 1960s Dennis Healey was Deputy Leader of the Labour Party today we have Angela Rayner which shows the changes .
The Worker’s Flag is Deepest Pink
Its not as red as you might think
And ever forward as we go
It soon will be as white as snow
So raise the banner, not too high
We’re much too young to do or die
Before the Party liquidates
We’ll all be Labour candidates
Given his admission of having made a fraudulent claim is there any reason why McCluskey should not be prosecuted?
Don’t you remember the song “you can’t touch me, I’m part of the Union”
Statute of limitations, surely.
Not for Fraud ??
Per Denning LJ in Lazarus Estates Ltd -v- Beasley [1956] 1 QB 702
Doesn’t apply to criminal offences which are never time-barred.
Unfortunately, our laws in statute of limitations allow some crimes to go unpunished. Murder is the only exception I’m aware of. (USA)
Well, I enjoyed the read, but now.. what can I really say about the total charlatan it exposes that would not be censored !? Better to tell an old joke –
Three hard working people and a Union Leader were discussing how clever their dogs were.
The first was an aircraft engineer who said his dog could do maths calculations. His dog was named T-square. He told the dog to get some paper and draw a square, a circle, and a triangle which the dog did with finesse.
The second person was an accountant who said she thought her dog was better. Her dog was called Calculator. She told the dog to fetch a dozen cookies, bring them back, and divide them into piles of three, which the dog did with ease.
The third, a chemist, said that his dog could do even better. He told his dog, named Measure, to get a pint of milk and pour half a pint into a glass. The dog did this immediately.
All three agreed that the three dogs were incredible and equally smart.
Then they all turned to the Union Leader and said, “what can your dog do” ?
The Union Leader whistled for his dog, who was named Coffee Break, and said, “show my fellow workers what you can do”.
Coffee Break promptly ate the cookies, drank the milk, s–t on the paper, sc–ed the other three dogs, claimed he had injured his back while doing so, filed a grievance for unsafe work conditions, applied for work-dog’s compensation and was driven back to his kennel, in his master`s limousine, on sick leave…..
The broken arm story and his satisfaction at the success of his lies and perverting justice – if not actually perjury, assuming he took or signed an oath or declaration that his account was the truth – tells us everything about the man we need to know.
As a member of Unite (and the TGWU before) I initially supported Mcuskey for General Secretary. But unfortunately power corrupts absolutely. I knew the man personally and had to tell him in the not so distant past, that if he was on fire, I would have to keep my urine for a much more deserving soul. He was not amused.
He stayed too long. He was corrupt. He was happy to keep up the “jobs for the boys” policy of previous GS. And as for the Karie Murphy debacle, he was happy to railroad genuine socialists to get uis own way.
The man is not someone to look up to and now he has gone, just maybe Unite can be the Union its lay members want it to be.
Or “The Man who made and enabled Johnson” which is what McCluskey did with his support for Corbyn.
Strange that those on the left still cannot see this, just as in the US the support for Hilary Clinton in 2016 almost certainly enabled Trump to be elected.
Hanging onto Biden is likely to lead to a second Trump victory or Harris taking over. She would almost certainly would never have stood any chance of formal election to President.
Then there is the fact that the 22nd Amendment has never been tested in law.
There’s no statute of limitations for fraud…
I’ve always had a vague distrust of the power of, and misused by, the big union capos, the lack of transparency and accountability, questioning their real motives & objectives Thanks to your article I now understand more clearly. Thanks
This man is pure evil.
Until he, and all who think like him are gone from public life, the political left will remain tainted and sour, completely unelectable – unfit for government or opposition, and therefore continuing to poison UK politics and public life.
The only input people like this offer is negative and toxic.
Fantastic hatchet job, I love it, and I imagine JK will *not* be on the McCluskey Christmas list this year.
Superb analysis – thanks James Kirkup
As far as I am aware there is no statute of limitation for the criminal fraud perpetrated by this gentleman. Who would like to nip round to the local nick and report him ?
Power tends to corrupt, although it may not have had much of a job to do here. Some of the comments though hint at a deep fear/dislike of working people.
?
Depends on the argument. I get the impression that labour was anti globalist back in the day, pre Blair. I’d say a bigger argument was lost by the free trade will rise all boats, a rising middle class will overthrow authoritarian rule in China and other places. If China is a threat now, it’s because of globalisation.
“At least Corbyn was consistent in his principles…” Apart from his Bennite opposition to the undemocratic and anti- working class EU. The one principle, had he stuck to it, that might very well have prospered his leadership… oh well.
UnHerd is a broad church of ideologies. However the whole partisan nonsense, the Corbyn hatred, is redolent of the telegraph and if I wanted to subscribe there I would.
A quick google of the writers profile and he is a member of the social market foundation, a think tank that supported new labour, was John Major’s favourite think tank and is probably on the Cameron end of the Tory party. Given that reality the partisan response here is amusing.
In other words it’s the policy of supposed centrism, the one that got us into this mess.
So what… even if one granted all that you say …Len McCluskey is still a nasty piece of work isn`t he?
New levels of Orwellian manipulation from Unherd there. The cliche that “Labour has become middle class” is usually centred on cultural issues – trans rights and so on. Yet here they’re bizarrely trying to lump in TRADE UNION ACTIVISM with that complaint! “Don’t stand up for workers’ rights because that makes you into [checks notes] a middle class lefty idiot who’s abandoned the working class!”
Just bizarre.
No mention of the Unite hotel? Corruption that sleazy Tories dream about but don’t have the guts to commit.
Unite union apparently doubles expenditure on hotel project to £74m | Unite | The Guardian