CWU general secretary Dave Ward will call tomorrow for a “new trade unionism for a new world of work” at the Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival in Dorset.

Mr Ward told the Morning Star that he had “never felt more enthused” than after last month’s general election result, which saw Labour win its biggest increase in vote share since 1945.

Trade unions such as his own had backed Labour leader Jeremy Corbyn and been rewarded with “a transformative manifesto.”

But he remained “genuinely angry at the insecure employment models and low pay” that dominate today’s workplace.

The CWU joined the TUC and many other unions this week in attacking the shortcomings of the Taylor review into working practices.

“But now the spotlight needs to shift on to us as a collective: what are we going to do about it?”

Mr Ward is keen for unions to adopt a common bargaining agenda to begin “a race to the top” on pay and conditions in workplaces, combined with publication of a “trade union manifesto on what we mean by a new deal for workers” and a plan for making it a reality at workplace level which does not rely on action by politicians — ideas he explores in an exclusive interview in tomorrow’s bumper Tolpuddle edition of the Morning Star.

He will speak on a new deal for workers in the Great Jobs Agenda session from 3pm in the Fringe Tent at the Tolpuddle Martyrs’ Festival tomorrow, alongside TUC deputy general secretary Paul Nowak and South West TUC policy and campaigns support officer Ines Lage.

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