Kate is on UNISON's NEC

This is good news - although I'm not sure that Sophie and Gregory agree.

Other peole have already made some valuable comments about the UNISON NEC election results.

I'm very pleased also for Paul Harper, Branch Secretary of NHS Logistics Branch in Maidstone, who has made a significant impact onto the SGE since becoming one of the Admin & Clerical Sector Committee's reps. He'll be able to do a lot more now he'll be coming to the meetings as a full member of the NEC.

The most dramatic thing is the significant gains made by the left in the 'industrial' seats - national elections for the two major service groups: Health and Local Government.  The extra significance of these NEC victories for the left is that all the people elected to the NEC in service group seats also get to take part in the relevant Service Group Executive.

I've always argued that the left paid relatively too much attention to the NEC, and not enough to the SGEs. Given that the whole point of a trade union is to organise workers collectively in our workplaces to defend our interests, the starting point for activists who want to make the union nationally do its job more effectively ought to be the industrial leadership of the SGEs - the NEC doesn't decide on things like pay claims or terms and conditions campaigns.

That the membership have decided to pay particular attention in the service group seats, and replace current NEC members in those seats with people who have campaigned for a more active fight on issues such as pay, pensions and cuts, suggests that the existing UNISON leadership have misjudged the membership of the union. That leadership can probably still count on a majority in support of pretty much any strategy it wants to propose, either to the NEC or to the SGEs, but they will have to consider now whether they really want to do that.

The other SGE seats (including mine) are up for reelection in about nine months' time. SGE members should give some thought to why the NEC elections have seen such a sweeping change in the service group seats, and make greater efforts to respond to the anger and frustration felt by UNISON members at the slow and limited nature of the union's fightback. We have a huge opportunity in front of us this summer to build a massive campaign for an above-inflation public sector pay rise, with UNISON at the heart of it, uniting both health and local government workers with our colleagues in education and the civil service. There is absolutely no rational argument against doing so. By electing Kate, Paul, and others who pledged to support such a strategy, onto UNISON's NEC, our members have shown their support for it.

I really hope that by next spring I can campaign in the SGE elections on the basis of being proud of the SGE's role in leading a fight for decent pay in the NHS, rather than as a minority voice.

None of this should be taken to mean that I don't think the NEC is important, or that victories in the regional seats (well done, Bernie) are insignificant. It is telling, however, that a disturbingly large number of the regional seats were not contested. Contested elections are sign of an organisation's democratic health (whatever the members of the Parliamentary Labour Party might think).