I HAVE the honour of addressing the Big Meeting at this year’s Durham Miners’ Gala, which is particularly important to me because I was raised in Durham and come from a mining family.

The systemic destruction of the coal industry by the Tories wasn’t just about jobs. It was about communities, families, shops, pubs and high streets. It was our communities and families that held us together and more than 30 years after the last Durham pit closed, the Gala is still here. Still strong and showing the world that communities like ours will not just roll over. That spirit is the Durham that made me.  

Things were tough when I left school in the ’90s; there weren’t many jobs for people like me. At 17, I had my daughter Abbie to support, and I was working at the wholesaler Makro. For the first time, things like contracts, childcare and pay mattered to me, so I joined Usdaw. The union I am now so incredibly proud to lead as our first woman general secretary.

Things are still tough for the members I represent in shops and warehouses across the country; we need change and we need it faster. After 14 years of the Tories, workers are impatient and despite the real successes of the Labour government, like the Employment Rights Act or keeping Britain out of Donald Trump’s disastrous war in Iran, they do not feel like change is happening fast enough.  

So, voters have been looking for alternatives elsewhere, including the Reform UK party. That’s a message the Labour Party needs to hear and respond by delivering the change that was promised at the election.

People want action on bad bosses and the cost of living, action that makes a real difference to their lives. When they don’t hear that from Labour, when the government stumbles into avoidable mistakes by not listening to unions and working people, a dangerous vacuum can form.

That is the space Reform is seeking to take up and exploit. It offers easy answers, masking a hard-right ideology behind warm words. They pretend to be the friends of working people, but when the Employment Rights Act was in Parliament, they repeatedly voted against it and they would repeal the Act on day one of a Reform government, along with the Equality Act. That’s not surprising after their Makerfield candidate proudly admitted he was a sexist.  

While we act in solidarity, they blame others. Instead of challenging policies that have left communities too far behind, they blame migrants for the problems working people face. That shows Reform really are not the friends of working people. Some have felt that Reform cannot be beaten and their success is inevitable, although Nigel Farage may struggle in his stunt by-election against Count Binface, but Makerfield gave us hope.

A few weeks ago, the labour movement came together with the communities we are part of, to show that the message of hate from Reform can be beaten. That if you want change, there is an alternative message of hope. That is how Andy Burnham won in Makerfield, with unity, not division.

But winning in Makerfield is not the end; Andy has a lot to live up to, a lot to deliver and a lot to change.  

He should start by looking at communities across Britain and provide workers with secure and decently paid jobs, by delivering the New Deal for Working People in full, without delay — including the ban on zero-hours contracts and the right to a contract that reflects the hours for all workers that we were promised. Including the ban on fire and rehire, and restrictions on bosses using technology to spy on their employees.  

Workers across Britain need that New Deal delivered in full and that is my strong message to Andy Burnham, who I hope will be our next prime minister. But this isn’t just about one person. We cannot place our faith in just one politician, and the far right will not be defeated without a Labour Party delivering for working people. Nor can we stop the far right without activism at the grass roots in our workplaces, communities, pubs, shops and cafes.

It’s working people like us who need to take the spirit of the Durham miners beyond the Big Meeting. Talk to our friends, neighbours and colleagues. We must tell them what Reform really stands for, that they are driven by division not unity, that there is hope and change can happen.

Joanne Thomas is general secretary of Usdaw.