Campaign for Trade Union Freedom

The Campaign For Trade Union Freedom was established in 2013 following a merger of the Liaison Committee For The Defence Of Trade Unions and the United Campaign To Repeal The Anti Trade Union Laws. The CTUF is a campaigning organisation fighting to defend and enhance trade unionism, oppose all anti-union laws as well as promoting and defending collective bargaining across UK, Europe and the World.

Constitution

(revised 2023)

A          Name

  1. The name of the organisation shall be the Campaign for Trade Union Freedom (hereafter, ‘the Campaign’).

 B          Objects

  1. The objects of the Campaign shall be to win trade union freedom in the UK, in particular by ensuring the following rights of all workers and trade unions.

i. the right to take and to organise and support strike and other industrial action, including solidarity action;
ii. the right to collective bargaining;
iii. the right to organise;
iv. the right of trade unions to draw up their own rules and constitutions, determine their own policies and activities, and spend their funds as they wish, free from state and employer interference;
v. the right to fulfilling work, decent pay, good conditions and fair employment rights.

  1. To repeal the anti-union laws.
  2. To extend the coverage of collective bargaining.
  3. To defend and enhance the fundamental rights guaranteed by international law, in particular (but not limited to) ILO Conventions 87 and 98, Articles 5 and 6 of the European Social Charter; Article 11 of the European Convention on Human rights; and Article 8 of the International Covenant on Economic, Social and Cultural Rights.
  4. To support workers and trade unions penalised or threatened by anti-union laws, or which adopt a policy of non-compliance with such laws.
  5. To assist in the mobilisation of solidarity (including international solidarity) amongst workers and trade union organisations in disputes or resistance to anti-working class policies.
  6. To seek to work with and influence the TUC, TUC affiliated trade unions (including regions, branches and officers), shop stewards’ and union workplace representatives’ committees, political parties (including the Labour Party), other labour movement and sympathetic bodies and overseas and international trade union organisations and campaigns in order to seek to achieve the above.
  7. To encourage the involvement of shop stewards and other union workplace representatives in campaigning for the above.
  8. To do anything lawful intended to further these objects or ancillary to the furtherance of them.

C          Subscriptions and voting

  1. Only bona fide paid-up trade union organisations (TUC, national unions, regional trade unions or regions of the TUC, Trade Union Councils, County Associations of Trade Union Councils, branches of unions, and shop stewards’ and union workplace representatives’ committees) may be represented on the National Committee and may vote.
  2. Trade union organisations (as above) and individuals must pay an annual subscription. The Officers from time to time will determine the annual rate of subscription of the various categories of membership. So long as the amount paid is equal to or more than the appropriate subscription, the payment may be described as a subscription, affiliation, donation, membership fee, contribution or support.
  3. All subscriptions are payable annually from 1 April each year. The National Secretary is empowered to reduce rates in cases of hardship.

D         Annual General Meeting

  1. There shall be an Annual General Meeting to hold the elections referred to below and to receive Reports of the activities of the Campaign. All subscribing organisations and individual members shall be entitled to attend the Annual General Meeting.
  2. The Annual General Meeting shall decide on the programme and policy of the Campaign for the coming year.
  3. Any vote in the Annual General Meeting shall be conducted on the basis of one vote for an individual; two votes for a Trades Union Council, union branch and shop stewards’ and union workplace representatives’ committee, five votes for a regional body and a County Association of Trades Councils; and ten votes for a national body.
  4. The Co-chairs shall chair the Annual General Meeting

E          National Committee

  1. There shall be a National Committee which, with the Officers, shall fulfil the programme and policy decided by the Annual General Meeting and deal with issues on which the Annual General Meeting has not given guidance.
  2. Each subscribing national trade union organisation will have one seat on the National Committee.
  3. Where a national trade union organisation is not a subscriber but one or more Regions of it are subscribers, they will have one seat on the National Committee and will decide amongst them who occupies it.
  4. Each Region of the TUC will have one seat on the National Committee.
  5. Each County Association of Trade Union Councils will have one seat on the National Committee.
  6. The National Committee shall have power to co-opt representatives from subscribing organisations to ensure the broadest representation on the basis of equality and diversity, geography, trades and industries, and to ensure that all levels of the movement (particularly shop stewards, union workplace representatives and shop stewards’ and union workplace representatives’ committees) are properly represented.
  7. The National Committee shall have the power to co-opt individual subscribers who it believes can be of particular service to the Campaign; such individual co-optees shall have no vote.
  8. The National Committee including co-optees will hold office until the next Annual General Meeting.
  9. At all times the National Committee shall seek to operate by consensus; if a vote is called for, each national trade union organisation shall have four votes, each regional trade union organisation shall have two votes and each other trade union organisation shall have one vote.
  10. The National Committee shall decide any issue on which this constitution is silent or in doubt.
  11. The National Committee shall meet as often as is necessary and one of the Co-chairs will chair each meeting.

F          Officers

  1. The Campaign shall have as Officers two Co-chairs (at least one of which must be a woman), National Secretary, Assistant Secretaries, Treasurer and such other Officers as the National Committee shall decide.
  2. The Campaign shall have a President and as many Vice-Presidents as the National Committee shall decide. The President shall be an Officer of the Campaign.
  3. The Officers, including the President, shall act as the executive committee of the Campaign.
  4. The Officers, President and Vice-Presidents shall be elected at the Annual General Meeting and hold office for one year.
  5. If not otherwise elected an Officer, the Director of the Institute of Employment Rights shall be an ex officio Officer of the Campaign.