GFTU BGCM Minutes 2017

on the spot, “blame the union, we will take the bullets, because we are quite

happy to”.

I am really pleased that later this year I am going to be doing a session at the

Liberating Arts Festival in Exeter which I hope many of you will be able to come

to and I am going to be talking about UNESCO’s work on the status of the artist

and I am going to broaden my presentation to all artists, not just musicians, but

that is the area of my knowledge. I think what we have got to say, and I would

like it to be the title of the actual weekend, is that we are liberating the arts and

respecting the artists and that is where I am going to come from and that is

what I am going to say. So that is a message I have got for you when you go

away to take back to your unions, because we have had unions who have

actually tried to put a band together and not pay them. They are professionals.

They work for a living and they need to be paid.

Before I finish I have got to talk a little bit about June 8 th . I echo what Ian

Lawrence said. Because of our system this election is going to be fought in

marginals. There are a number of MPs that work closely with our union and we

know them particularly well. They will get off their backsides in Parliament and

ask a question. They work very hard. About a good half dozen or more of

them are in very vulnerable marginals and we could lose some very, very good

people, so we have got to secure them, get them back in and make sure that

we fight the Tories on that ground. I was talking earlier to someone about what

happened in Croydon in the last election and this was part of this whole

corruption that has fallen off the agenda now with Tories spending money. The

bussed loads and loads of activists into this marginal seat, loads of them,

swamped them with it and, of course, they won. The local Labour Party in that

particular constituency were pretty poor. We cannot let that happen, we cannot

let it happen, we have got to do that this time. I totally agree with Ian again,

let’s talk about PR, because we have got to get something fairer. Above all, we

want a Labour Government and it is incumbent on us all to work towards that.

There we go. I am going to be carrying on. I have been on all of those

committees you have got in the book. I think I am on every one. I am a

227