Tribune article - October 15th

New shortlist in Unite election campaign
October 15, 2009 11:58 pm Tribune web editor frontpage, news
by René Lavanchy

Unite assistant general secretary Les Bayliss was this week leading in a bid to win a nomination to run in next year’s general secretary election.

He came first in the first hustings meeting organised by the Workers Uniting Group faction in Doncaster last week. National officers Paul Reuter and Brian Boyd came second and third in the poll of about 45 members.

The winning candidate will compete alongside assistant general secretary Len McCluskey from the T&G, who won the United Left faction’s nomination last month. A fifth possible candidate, Jerry Hicks, is still considering running.

Mr Bayliss, from the former Amicus side of Unite, told Tribune many ex-T&G members were backing him: “The support I’ve been getting across Unite has been encouraging”.

Mr Reuter, who also claims support from the T&G, said Unite needed to do more to become one union: “We’re still running as two unions. No organisation can run with two at the head.”

Mr Boyd shrugged off his vote: “There’ll be areas of support in different regions for all the candidates.” Nine more hustings are planned, with the final result expected in mid-November.