The long running political witch-hunt conducted by the leadership of MSF against the union's London Regional Council reached a climax with the infliction of a six-year ban from office on Susan Michie, the former Regional President. Ms. Michie was punished at the end of a two-year investigation conducted in breach of the union's rules and policies and with disregard for natural justice. No proof was adduced for the charges brought against her. The punishment is in excess of the powers of the NEC

 

The background to the ban lies in the steadily growing antipathy between the London Regional Council and the national leadership, in particular the General Secretary Roger Lyons, over virtually the entire lifetime of MSF. The disputes were broadly along the left/right lines familiar in many unions but were given a special flavour by the dishonesty and vindictiveness of the national leadership. They covered all sorts of matters concerned with the running of the union and also a wide political agenda, not least relations with the Labour government and the Labour Party.

 

By 1999, the officers of the Regional Council, primarily Susan Michie as President and myself as Secretary, were under siege. I had already been subjected to three separate investigations and Susan Michie two, all got up on spurious grounds. London was not unique in that respect; the union's disciplinary procedures, which are operated by the NEC in respect of lay members, were increasingly being used to apply pressure on political opponents of the leadership across the union.

 

At this point, the Labour Party leadership executed a volte face on the method of selection of its candidate for London mayor. They reneged on a previous pledge to conduct this by one member, one vote and instead brought in an electoral college involving the London unions and MPs. By this means they hoped to prevent Ken Livingstone from becoming the candidate.

 

One consequence of this manoeuvre was that MSF London was excluded from the electoral college, along with some other union bodies, by reason of the late payment of our affiliation fee to the Greater London Labour Party in 1998. The reasons for this late payment are discussed below. In my opinion, though others take a darker view, our exclusion was an unintended consequence of the procedures adopted by the Labour Party, which were put together in rather a hasty manner, but once it was discovered that a wodge of likely Livingstone votes had been ruled out, the Labour Party was not going to change its mind voluntarily in what everyone reckoned to be an extremely tight contest..

 

Lyons seized on our exclusion as his opportunity to settle matters with his London opponents. He arranged for abusive comment aimed at the London officers to be carried in the newspapers and on television. He wrote to all the NEC members and all the fulltime officials throughout the union pointing the finger at us. He also wrote to all 18,000 political levy payers in London attempting to pin the blame on the London officers. The staff in the Regional office were instructed to inform callers that the London officers were at fault and to encourage them to make complaints to the General Secretary. All of this was before he'd had any explanation of the circumstances or any formal proceedings had been set up. Quite a lot of it was in breach of his authority and involved the expenditure of substantial amounts of union funds.

 

While this was going on, I sought legal advice, with the agreement of my colleagues on the Regional Management Committee and with the encouragement of many people who contacted me to urge some action be taken. The advice was that there was a reasonable case for challenging the Labour Party decision in the courts but that action needed to be started on the spot in view of our understanding at the time of the probable timetable of events. I therefore authorised the legal people to start proceedings, initially in the name of MSF London Regional Council. When possible objections to this were raised, within a couple of days the action was changed to be in the name of a group of individuals. It should be said that as soon as the Labour Party leadership became aware of the possibility of aware, they immediately ran round to Lyons to get his assistance and he immediately began threatening me to try and get the action called off. The case was ultimately heard in the High Court and we lost, which is a story in itself. I paid the legal bills out of my own pocket though have subsequently recouped a very high proportion of these through the agency of a defence fund. As an aside, our exclusion did not ultimately affect the result in the electoral college; if our votes had been counted, Dobson would still have squeaked through though by an even narrower majority.

 

All these events concerning the Labour Party were compressed into little over a fortnight and were concluded by Susan Michie and I being suspended from our posts by the NEC and an investigation being launched into the circumstances. Also suspended at the same time was David Beaumont, the Regional Treasurer, who had been on holiday at the relevant time and had played no part in the affair. Prior to this, David had not really been involved in our wars with Head Office but he subsequently distinguished himself with his website exposing financial corruption at the top of the union. This is a rather good example of Lyons and his crew creating a rod for their own back through heavy-handed incompetence.

 

With the benefit of hindsight I have no regrets for anything that happened. The pursuit of a court case against the Labour Party to get our vote back, which was what everyone wanted, was the only option which offered any chance of success. My decision to begin proceedings had to be taken on the spot, was subsequently endorsed by the Regional Council, and was supported by the huge majority of members who contacted me. Lyons, who was under some pressure also to make an effort to retrieve the vote, wrote to Margaret McDonagh, the then General Secretary of the Labour Party, along these lines. In my view, that was a fraudulent exercise, simply for the sake of appearances, and with no intention of applying real pressure. My evidence for saying so is that McDonagh never raised the letter on the Labour Party NEC, the only body that could reinstate us, Lyons let this pass, and Margaret Wall, the MSF person on the Labour Party NEC, never raised the issue. A court case was the only realistic possibility, the legal advice was that we had a chance, I knew I could fund it and I had confidence in my colleagues putting their hands in their pockets for me, subsequently borne out. So I went for it. If, in the process, that entailed giving the finger to Lyons and the Labour Party, clearly regarded as the real offence by the MSF leadership, that was an acceptable price to pay for trying to carry out the wishes of the people who elected me.

 

It could be argued that we got into an avoidable and unwinnable confrontation with Lyons because of inefficiency, if not negligence, in the performance of basic union duties. In fact, the allegation of incompetence or negligence, first made by Lyons without reference to the facts, and subsequently parroted by the NEC investigators, is untrue, as I shall argue later. Moreover, the relations between London and the national union were such that a showdown was going to take place sooner or later. The particular form it took was quite unexpected but once it arose, there was no choice but to fight it through. It may seem rash to have embarked on a court action against the Labour Party when Lyons was on the warpath but by that stage there was going to be disciplinary action anyway.

 

Anyway, at the end of the showdown, there David, Susan and I were, in a manner of speaking, each on a horse under a tree with ropes around our necks. It only remained for the NEC to think up some grounds for a conviction before giving the horses a slap. The rest of this article examines the fairness and reasonableness of this process as it applies to Susan Michie.

 

In MSF, discipline of lay members and associated investigations are the province of the NEC. The rules governing the processes are fairly extensive but somewhat loosely drafted and open to varying interpretations. There is a final appeal stage conducted by members elected at Conference but this only comes into play after the NEC has awarded a punishment. Actually, the rules really refer to a different era of trade unionism when they were intended to deal with members failing to support industrial action at workplace level, Thus the rules provided for proceedings to be initiated at local level and for an attempt to be made to resolve them there before the NEC had to step in. Such usage has died out and in recent years the rules have only been invoked to deal with alleged misconduct within the union. Increasingly, the rules were directed against opponents of the national union. In effect, the NEC became a protagonist in disputes rather than an adjudicator of local differences. The NEC was enabled to act as prosecutor, jury and judge in cases which it brought itself. I would argue that such a procedure is automatically unfair and an abuse of the rights of people caught up in such cases.

 

In practice, the NEC appoints a panel of three of its members to act as an Investigating Committee whose job according to the rules is to enquire into the circumstances and then report back. The Committee secretary is always a senior fulltime official even though the rules preclude officials from being members of such a committee. In recent times a rather curious practice has grown up of appointing successively both an Investigating Committee and then a Disciplinary Committee, comprising a second panel of three NEC members. It is the second panel that recommends the punishment. However it can be fairly argued that the second panel and its recommendations have no standing within the rules. The various committees proceed by examining documents and questioning the defendants and possibly some witnesses. The questioning is carried out in a highly aggressive manner, most of all by the committee secretary who is not supposed to be a member of the panel at all. An indictment, rather than a report, is then sent to the NEC.

 

The NEC has never been known to overturn the recommendations of one of its panels. Every facet of the investigatory/disciplinary procedure has therefore been contested since that is the crucial part of the process. Major battles have been fought over the interpretation of the rules and these even spilled over into Annual Conference where we succeeded in having a resolution carried which notably improved the rights of accused persons. For me, the most critical aspect of all of this was the refusal by the leadership to permit verbatim records of hearings to be made. To my mind, if such proceedings are to be regarded as fair and equitable, they must be open and transparent. Apart from anything else, members of the union should be able to find out what is being done in their name. The NEC, on the other hand, tries to proceed in secret. And in secrecy, abuses flourish such as adjusting the record of hearings to suit the objectives of those initiating the proceedings.

 

There is a major flaw in the rules in that the NEC is not required to prove its case before taking disciplinary action but only needs to form an opinion that some transgression has occurred. This need not be a problem for honest people who could decide to form their opinion on the basis of evidence and proof. But it makes life a lot easier for people who are not concerned with such scruples.

 

Let us see how all this came together for Susan Michie. As I have outlined above, I did the deeds in this affair, as was pretty well known at the time. How then was it possible to pin the blame on someone else without being able to demonstrate that they were involved. The answer was that it wasn't necessary to make a case.

 

The Investigating Committee set up immediately after our suspension sat for four months and then produced a voluminous report with very little substance. This report was most notable for an allegation of misappropriation of union funds brought against the Regional Council officers elected to replace us. This allegation was entirely false nor was any evidence produced to sustain it. The purpose was to smear the reputation of the people involved, create the impression that there were serious issues under investigation and provide the pretext for punitive measures. It needs to be noted that though it has long been noted that the allegation is baseless, it has never actually been withdrawn.

 

The next step was to bring forward charges against the suspended officers. In Susan Michie's case, the charges were contained in a letter sent to her in May 2000 by the Investigating Committee secretary, Lucy Anderson. The provenance of these charges is important as Ms. Anderson is specifically excluded from the disciplinary procedure and there is no evidence that those properly part of the procedure were involved in drawing up the charges. Thus, it can be argued that the charges were prepared outside the rules. Anyway, this is what Ms Anderson had to say: 

 

"As Regional President you colluded with the Regional Secretary in taking action that resulted in breaches of the union's Rules. It is well known that you are closely associated with the Regional Secretary and would have been kept informed throughout as to the Regional Secretary's actions. You chose to ignore your responsibilities as Regional President in ensuring that the breaches of Rule did not take place. Instead it is contended that you chose to support the actions of the Regional Secretary. The actions complained of are as follows:

 

1. Failure to pay the Labour Party affiliation fee for 1998 in time. As a result members of the London Regional Council were disentitled to vote in the election for the selection of the Labour candidate for London Mayor.

 

2. You colluded in the false accounting and representation that there were insufficient funds to meet the affiliation fee which was not the case.

 

3. You colluded in the instruction of solicitors to take action on behalf of the London Regional Council against the Labour Party even though you knew or should have done that this was in breach of Rules 39(c) and that it went beyond the functions of the Regional Council and Rule 39(j).

 

4. Solicitors were instructed with the intention of using Regional Council funds to pay their fees which is not covered by Rule 39(j).

 

5. As a result of the matters set out above it is contended that you are in breach of Rules 16a(i) (breach of rule), (ii) (action against the interests of the union), (iii) (misappropriation), (iv) (neglect of duty)."

 

There we have it. In the absence of any evidence of wrongdoing on Susan Michie's part, she is accused of being an associate of someone else and colluding with that person in the alleged transgressions. Well, it is true that Susan Michie and I were and are associates and that we frequently discussed the affairs of MSF as part of our respective duties and more broadly. For that, we must put our hands up.

 

But that is as far as it goes. The NEC could find no evidence of collusion over the specific matters which concerned the investigators for the simple reason that it does not exist.

 

For the purpose of trying to make the charge of collusion stick, the NEC has invented the doctrine that the President had some kind of supervisory or invigilating role over the other officers of the Regional Council. There is no basis for this in the rule book which specifies the duties of the main officers, I have never heard such a doctrine invoked in other circumstances during 30 years' practice as a trade union official and I can find no trace of it in either Citrine or Hannington. The division of labour between the chair and secretary of a committee can vary according to the inclination of the individuals involved and they obviously need to co-operate with each other but they are not responsible for how each other does their job. The line of accountability is to the body which elects them. I didn't submit the minutiae of day-to day administration to the President's attention nor was there any reason for us to operate in this way. The NEC has invented this doctrine only for the purpose of embroiling people like Susan Michie in matters about which they have no knowledge or responsibility.

 

Nor is there any more substance to the specific charges. The London Regional Council got into arrears in the payment of its affiliation fees to the Greater London Labour Party from the mid-90s onwards. The GLLP did not object and our affiliated status was not in question. The point of our court case was that we had been continually affiliated and the Labour Party did not contest this, relying on a different argument. In fact, the Labour Party subsequently changed its rules about the late payment of fees.

 

The fees to the GLLP were approximately the same as our annual political income. Despite claims by the MSF finance department to the contrary, there was never enough money in the fund to make up the arrears. This was a long-standing administrative problem and it was eventually decided to tackle by reviewing the level of our affiliation; this job was given by the Regional Council to the regional political committee early in 1998. That committee took its time going about the job and was still deliberating when the Labour Party decided to set up its electoral college the following year. In the meantime, I continued the practice of arranging the payment of fees in arrears.

 

There is no rule or national policy in MSF which requires Regional Councils to affiliate to regional Labour Parties. It is normal for them to do so but by no means universal. For example, the Southern Regional Council was not affiliated to the GLLP at this time even though it represented a lot of members in London – no criticism ever attached to it for not enabling its members to take part in the electoral college. Each Regional Council was entitled to decide for itself what it wanted to do.

 

I did what the Regional Council required of me, i.e. took the necessary steps to maintain our affiliation to the GLLP. There was no breach of rule, or neglect of duty or failure to observe the interests of the union. If this was true of me, who had the responsibility, how much more true is it of Susan Michie who had not.

 

The next charge is that it was a breach of rule to seek to bring an action against the Labour Party through the medium of the Regional Council. Leave aside the fact that this attempt only lasted for two days and was set aside when it was challenged. For that short period such an attempt was made. However, it is by no means clear that any breach of the union's rules was involved. The MSF house lawyer asserted that it was. My lawyers asserted differently. I took the view that the matter was unclear and not worth the risk of proceeding along such lines when another perfectly serviceable route would do. I suspect that if you asked ten lawyers about this point, you would get ten different replies, depending on what the lawyers thought the client wanted to hear.

 

I do not contend that the Regional Council is able to start court proceedings. It may perfectly well be the case that it is not. But if the NEC wants to make disciplinary charges stick in this area, then it is obliged to bring forward some evidence for its case, which could only be the opinion of some reputable and unbiased person. This it signally failed to do, either at the time of Ms. Anderson's letter or subsequently. If there is any such evidence we are still waiting to see it. They would also need to connect Susan Michie to the circumstances and they failed in this as well.

 

Finally. there is the issue of misappropriation. Note that Ms. Anderson does not allege that any misappropriation took place but asserts that there was an intention to misappropriate, i.e. we have moved into the realm of thought crimes. Set aside, for the moment, the fact that Ms. Anderson could not possible know of my intentions at the relevant moment. There was a great deal of documented evidence to the contrary. This comprised minutes of a Management Committee meeting and a letter to Lyons stating that no union funds would be used in the affair. There was also a letter from my solicitor to me stating that I would be personally responsible for the bills. All this predated our suspension. If push came to shove, I could produce two barristers and a solicitor to testify that I insisted that I would be responsible for payment when we met to discuss how to proceed. This all seems pretty good evidence for my intentions and doesn't leave a lot for Susan Michie to collude with.

 

Why then did Lucy Anderson produce a damaging allegation of intended misappropriation which she could not possibly know to be true? The answer lies in the type of culture which has evolved at the top of MSF. Something similar took place at the Marcia Solomon employment tribunal. She was the whistleblower who took an unfair dismissal case as part of the Lyons/Chowcat corruption saga. During the proceedings, another senior fulltime MSF official asserted over and over, without a shred of evidence, that Marcia Solomon had been motivated for unspecified reasons by a desire to undermine the General Secretary, a heinous offence in his book, rather than acting in good faith in bringing forward her evidence of corruption. His assertions produced consternation in the tribunal members and sank the union's case, at a cost of £200 000. In this instance, behaviour which is allowable within the union collided with the real world. But in the MSF world, where accountability has broken down, it is perfectly proper to fabricate allegations if they help you do what you want to do.

 

After the charge sheet was produced the Disciplinary Committee spent nearly two years deciding what to do. In the end, they found Susan Michie guilty as charged even though they were not able to show evidence of collusion nor provide any proof that the allegations against another party, myself, were actually offences under the union's rules.

 

The committee members recommended she be given a six-year ban from office to run from the date of the original suspension in 1999. This was accepted by the NEC. Shortly after her original suspension, Susan Michie was elected to the NEC in a ballot of London members. She has never been able to take up her seat. The import of a six-year ban is that she would not be eligible to be a candidate in the next election for the Amicus NEC. However disbarral from office is not one of the penalties which the NEC is entitled to impose for the charges on which Susan Michie has been convicted. There is another way in which members can be disbarred though this can only be for a maximum of five years.

 

This is altogether a sorry story of how political differences are dealt with in a major union. There was longstanding tension between the national leadership and part of the union which the leadership increasingly attempted to resolve by administrative means. The leadership saw an opportunity to go for broke and pressed on regardless even though examination of the issues shows their case to be weak to non-existent. As with the corruption scandal, the affair reveals a fundamental lack of integrity in the people who run MSF. They work very hard at covering this up but it is important to lay the issues before the union's members so that they can decide if they want their union to go on being run in this fashion.

 

Hugh MacGrillen

2002

 

 

 

The Non Aligned, Rank and File, Trade Union Journal

Further Reading:
MSF Leadership in the political gutter
Expulsion Chronology
Is MSF a corrupt organisation?