The level of ineptitude with which Theresa May’s desperation bid to entice the unions into supporting her dismal Brexit deal was conducted is a story that needs to be told.

The prime minister’s first mistake was to leave TUC general secretary Frances O’Grady off the list of union leaders to call – and the labour movement took note. One union source I spoke to described themselves as staggered that Number 10 could make such a mistake.

O’Grady, whom I know well, is consensus builder. She has proven herself to be adept at working with people who would not normally be considered allies, such as the CBI and the Institute of Directors, and who largely speak highly of her.

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The rank discourtesy shown to O’Grady by May served to further alienate trade unionists, and made it look like she was playing a cynical game of divide and rule.

O’Grady, as the leader of the movement’s umbrella body, could and should have been called in addition to the three union leaders the PM tried to contact directly. Not doing so was incredibly stupid, and represented a missed opportunity to at least generate a little goodwill. That is not a commodity the prime minister enjoys an overabundance of.

The three union bosses deemed worthy of an approach were, as has been widely reported, Len McCluskey from Unite, Dave Prentice from Unison and Tim Roache from the GMB.

Now, you might have thought that a leader claiming to want to create a “Britain that works for everyone” would already have held at least the odd conversation with those people and had their numbers in the contacts book. Regardless of the political differences they might have, they represent millions of working people. But no. Astonishingly, I’m told that in at least one case, the first approach was made via one of the unions’ call centres.

Frances O’Grady threatens to call for a popular vote: ‘I am serving Theresa May notice’

Two conversations were ultimately had, with McCluskey and Roache, and they were the first since the prime minister moved into Number 10 in 2016. (Prentice was unavailable because he was travelling.)

Roache said he would have been prepared to support a deal that did a good job for his members but May’s does not do that. It will damage their prosperity and many will lose their jobs.

As such, he commendably made it clear that those members should, along with the rest of the British public, be given the final say on what’s on offer. He went on to wryly observe that at least the prime minister had finally picked up the phone.

It is not just O’Grady who has been on the receiving end of the disdainful “I’m the boss and it’s my way or the highway” stance that May has taken up to this point.

McCluskey, who is close to Jeremy Corbyn, has been in lockstep with the Labour leader’s call for a general election to break the impasse, which it is unlikely to do. Lines of communication are expected to be kept open. But he should have a care.

May’s opening gambit was to talk up an amendment to the meaningful vote on the Brexit deal that was drawn up by Labour MPs with Brexit-voting constituencies. It would purportedly protect workers’ rights and the environment. They even received civil service advice in drawing it up.

However, another union source pointed out that it is fatally flawed. “The problem with it is that it carries no real force and certainly wouldn’t see the UK keeping pace with any improvements made by Europe,” they said. “The other issue is that it would be perfectly open to a future right-wing Tory government to tear it up.”

That is a very real danger.

It’s notable that one of the party’s future potential leaders, who has been preening and pouting and flaunting his credentials as a born-again Brexiteer, is the home secretary Sajid Javid.

The same Sajid Javid was at the forefront of the Cameron government’s decision to needlessly drive a tank onto the unions’ lawns with a piece of ugly and regressive legislation designed to further stifle their ability to act in the interests of their members.

Even the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development laid into it and said it represents HR people who usually find themselves at the sharp end of industrial strife.

But, of course, industrial strife is vanishingly rare in modern Britain. The sole purpose of the legislation was simply to offer a sop to the Conservative Party’s hard anti-union right wing, which has been driving Brexit and pushing aggressively for a no deal that would have a devastating impact on working people.

That wing was unable to dislodge May with a confidence vote but may have more success when it comes to her successor. The party’s membership, which will have the final say on the next Tory prime minister, is dominated by ageing and bigoted nationalists. They also nurse a reactionary hatred for trade unions which are still the only voluntary bodies in Britain that are banned from polling their members online.

If May had any misgivings about the legislation while serving as home secretary, she didn’t make them widely known.

For all those reasons, and more besides, Roache had the right of it.

The judgement on any part of the movement that tacks away from his stance and opts to play a role in facilitating a hard May Brexit will be harsh indeed.  

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