Winning friends and influencing people

In London today for, among other things, the launch of David Coat's Fabian Society Pamphlet, 'Raising Lazarus: The future of organised labour'.

David used to head up the TUC's economics department and is now working at the Work Foundation. His pamphlet contains a pretty good analysis of the membership challenge facing unions (as well as some of the tensions in the Labour-union link), and I agree with one of its basic propositions, namely that 'Membership decline is not inevitable, and unions remain the masters of their fate'.

On the negative-side, I thought it was bit light on practical solutions - what unions can actually do in the real world to turn round membership decline. It also contained a few unnecessary personal digs at some key union figures, such as Derek Simpson and Mark Serwotka, which frankly will only serve to alienate some of the pamphlet's potential audience - which would be a shame as its a good controbution to a vital debate.

My potted review? 'Nice analysis; shame about the point-scoring'.

If you've managed to get hold of a pamphlet feel free to post your thoughts on it in the comments section.