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In British politics, an affiliated trade union is one that is linked to the Labour Party. The party was created by the trade unions and socialist societies in 1900 as the Labour Representation Committee and the unions have retained close institutional links with it.
Affiliated unions pay an annual fee to the Labour Party; in return, they elect thirteen of the thirty-nine members of Labour's National Executive Committee and fifty per cent of the delegates to Labour Party Conference. Local union branches also affiliate to Constituency Labour Parties and their members who are also individual members of the Party may represent the union as delegates on Labour Party structures.
Individual members may opt out of paying into a union's political fund which is used to finance the affiliation.
Since 1994, affiliated trade unions have organised themselves into TULO - The Trade Union & Labour Party Liaison Organisation, with a small number of staff to manage the relationship between the unions and the Party. A national TULO committee, with the unions' general secretaries, the Party Leader and Deputy Leader, General Secretary and NEC Chair and MPs' representatives, meets regularly to co-ordinate work and policy.
Until 1995, each union exercised a block vote at party conferences; since then, multiple delegates of a single union get an equal share of its voting allocation.[1]
- ^ Brivati, B.; Heffernan, R. (2000). The Labour Party: A Centenary History. Springer. p. 234. ISBN 978-0-230-59558-3. Retrieved 14 January 2020.