SO WE still don’t know the outcome of the parliamentary vote on Theresa May’s Brexit deal, or whether there will even be one — she’s pushed it into the new year and can presumably push it further.

Like you all I’ve watched an incredible political storm unfold, trying to second guess what happens next. The only thing we can expect in politics now is the unexpected. It’s at times like these that I fall back on my instincts and experience.

And whatever I hear or read on Brexit I keep coming back to the same two points.

First, with record levels of in-work poverty, the huge pressure CWU members are coming under at work — and we all know how busy our postal worker members are at this time of year — a generation unable to access a decent home and public services pushed to crisis point, we need fundamental change in this country.

In or out of the EU, I know that will only come with a transformative Labour government.

Second, for all the statistics we hear about Brexit, the most important fact is this: in the past 40 years as a result of privatisation, competition and attacks on trade union rights, the share of the economy going to workers’ wages has fallen from more than 65 per cent in 1976 to less than 50 per cent today.

This reflects a huge shift in the balance of forces in this country and again, in or out of the EU, it is our responsibility to reverse this. I have never been more convinced of the need to mobilise the trade union movement to campaign for a bold new deal for all workers and this fight starts not in Brussels, but right here in Britain.

Through 2018 we have led on this agenda in the TUC. It’s been a good year for the CWU and we see that many trade unions share our conviction that a movement-wide campaign, fighting for a better deal for all workers, can make a real difference — winning change at work, ending the long decline in trade union membership and influence and helping to bring about a different Britain.

As we’ve seen in inspirational “gig economy” action by GMB at Amazon and Uber, by the BFAWU at McDonald’s and Wetherspoon, by Unite at TGI Friday’s and more, it is possible for unions to recruit and recruit quickly in sectors where we are currently weak if we act decisively to challenge bad bosses and convince workers that they are stronger together.

We need to see these excellent campaigns become part of one struggle. The issues facing so many of our members are the same: unaffordable housing, in-work poverty, insecure contracts, low pay, pensions that won’t support a bearable retirement.

And we have a common interest in challenging the increasing intensity of work, the long hours and unreasonable demands that are leading to rising stress and increased mental health problems all while actually being proven to make workers less productive.

Surely we can make 2019 the year we develop a common bargaining agenda around many of these issues, one where each union can point to its own issues and say, that’s how this ties into the whole.

And fighting together, with a Labour Party which has shown through the Manifesto for Labour Law it has produced with the Institute of Employment Rights that it is prepared to think big, we can begin to show what the world of work we want to see would look like. 

Because it isn’t just that the current system is an oppressive place for workers. It’s failing to deliver even by its own standards. As we saw with Carillion, a smash-and-grab culture at the top of companies sees their long-term survival go by the board so long as a few executives can get rich. 

Our union has seen in talks over the future of the Post Office the lack of imagination and innovation that could see a great institution, which could have a great future, go to the wall because there is no willingness to invest in the future or use the strengths that exist to help shape the services we will need down the line.

Talk of the technological revolution that is sweeping the world is too often negative, focused on how many jobs are at risk. But our movement can turn around and say: “Where’s our share of the rewards that the fourth industrial revolution will bring?” We shouldn’t be afraid of talking about the four-day week or of how we would adjust the current expectations of staff to create a better work-life balance for all of us.

Industrially our union has delivered very good agreements for our members on pay, pensions, terms and conditions. We are now a far more effective campaigning organisation and we have significantly raised our political profile. 

On communications and engagement we are now seen as the union that sets the benchmark for others to follow. And through redesign we have shown the courage to address the financial and organisational pressures that threaten our future as a stand-alone union.

In 2019 we will build on all of our achievements by increasingly acting as one union and connecting our industrial, wider trade union and political agendas. With the forces that are against us this is the best and only way to face the future. A key priority will also be to overhaul our recruitment and organising work and develop a more effective and ambitious approach.

And if unions are seen to be leading that fight across the board, we’ll also do our bit to defeat the racism which has been rising in this country. I agree with Dennis Skinner’s assessment that the way to fight racism is to join the union. 

A union-organised workplace brings workers together, and shows them their common interests and who their real enemy is — the one imposing the zero-hours contract or the below-inflation pay award or the pensions grab. The campaign for a new deal for workers can be an effective weapon in the fight against the far right and I believe it should be our movement’s priority in the year ahead, as we build for a day of action where unions use all their collective strength, membership, communications skills and ideas to promote our message to the whole country in an unmissable way.

I’m looking forward to working with other unions and of course the Morning Star to build the campaign for a new deal into a serious challenge to a system that clearly doesn’t work for the vast majority. And I wish all the paper’s readers and supporters a great Christmas and a very happy new year.

Dave Ward is general secretary of the CWU.