Unite Mobilising In Key Marginals

Unite is mobilising members to canvass for Labour in key marginal constituencies, and help counteract the money being poured into the areas by the Conservative election team.

Up to 100,000 Unite members in 90 marginals will be contacted by the union, in the hope that it will galvanise support for the government.

"In 90 key seats the Unite membership is larger than the current Labour majority," said Charlie Whelan. "If almost every Unite member voted Labour, we would win the election. If the union delivers votes it has a lot more influence than if it simply delivers cash. That is the brutal truth."

He added: "Unions traditionally had a policy of bunging money to the party and saying 'get on with it', but we have taken a different approach. In terms of resources there is no way in a million years we can match what Lord Ashcroft is putting in to the Conservative party."

The technique has been borrowed from Barack Obama's election team and Charlie Whelan is hoping that the union member-to-union member approach will generate new levels of Labour support.

Unite is using a virtual phone bank, software that lets activists access a list of members living in a region's marginal seats and phone them. "You don't need to go to the union's local office or a call centre any longer to make these calls," he said. "The beauty of the system is that it can work anywhere. Unite members are quite happy talking to other members."

So far, 1,000 activists are using the phone bank regularly. Unite's head office can see how many calls are made daily, and monitor the running issues.

Charlie Whelan said: "At present we are on course for 100,000 members being called in the key seats, by the time of the election. All I can say in terms of feedback, is how much union members enjoy doing it, and how pleased they are to get a call from another member. One reason it works because it is not coming from a political party. It is not just about asking members to vote Labour. If it was, it would not work. It is also about ascertaining their views. One goal is to find out what issues are motivating union members."

The answers, he said, were often immigration and protection of wages and conditions. "This cannot be a cynical exercise. They want to know their views are going to be listened to. So if we ask them their views, we have to push them inside the union. It's true our members have not been happy with Labour, but at no stage has there been a mass desertion from Labour to the Tories. We have been doing a real opinion poll every day."

The idea of direct member-to-member contact has been influenced by how Obama drew on organisations such as the United Steelworkers of America (USW).

Charlie Whelan said: "For many years the USW has had a successful strategy of talking to its members on a regular basic. It knew what they thought. As a result, the union managed to persuade 90% of those who voted, to vote for Obama."

For more information visit:

http://unite4labour.org/