GFTU BGCM Minutes 2017

ways of starting to achieve that. Obviously the biggest example at the moment

is Quorn and we have discussed that and how that works. Every penny spent

there comes back into the Educational Trust, providing more for you, reducing

your costs.

We have started to work with a whole range of suppliers, Lighthouse Financial

Services will say a few words this morning and, of course, we will be launching

a new set of legal services with Morrish Solicitors and Paul will say something

about that, but we do have some other colleagues who are working with us.

You will have seen TC Branding have produced some material and they are

the main supplier of promotional materials for the movement. We have also

got with us Tony Johnson on ICT. Every union, as far as I can see, has

struggled with ICT and there are plenty of sharks in the sea out there that like

to charge unions a lot of money for their ICT on the basis that no one in the

unions can particularly get a grip on exactly what all the technicalities and the

complications are. Tony is absolutely expert in ICT and has worked for the

movement most of his life and he knows how to save us money and cut

through all the nonsense and get the best ICT services for unions, so he is

working with us as well. The basic arrangement that we have with such

suppliers is that if there is any business generated, our Educational Trust gets

a little commission on that, so I think you will find that with such suppliers

unions will get a better deal cheaper on the things that they are getting

provided, but you have got the added bonus of those companies sharing our

values and putting a bit back into the trust to keep us sustained.

So that is the basic concept behind this paper and a whole range of new

partnerships are coming on board to try and support that concept so that the

Educational Trust becomes more self-sustaining so that we do not have to

charge affiliates any more than the already very, very reasonable 98p per

member per year. I do not think there is any union that pays those affiliations

that gets less back in return, if you see what I mean. Everyone is subsidised in

one way or another by the way in which our economics internally work with the

support of the trust. That is the concept and Ian will give us a few other

illustrations of the way we are working.

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