THIS year I am leading a delegation of Usdaw members to the annual Labour Party conference in Brighton.

Right now, we have a reckless, incompetent Tory government, led by a habitual liar. A government intent on dismantling our welfare state, stripping back our employment rights and cutting our public services back to the bone.

A government so obsessed with delivering Brexit at any cost, that it will ignore the rule of law and drag the country off a cliff to get there. So it is crucial that working people’s voices are heard above all the noise and chaos.

Creating this chaos is a government without a parliamentary majority, riven by internal party divisions and which has spectacularly failed to deliver Brexit. Usdaw has consistently said that we would oppose any EU withdrawal deal that fails to protect workers’ rights, ensure frictionless trade and maintain the Good Friday Agreement by avoiding a hard border in Ireland.

A no-deal Brexit would be a disaster for Usdaw members, and for all working people, when we know that the Tories would use it to create a free-for-all, deregulated labour market. It would be a race to the bottom, where the lowest paid and most vulnerable would suffer the most. We need to give the people a final say on Brexit.

While Brexit will inevitably dominate coverage of the conference, we need to get on with rebuilding our economy, tackling the retail crisis and saving our shops and high streets.

It falls to the Labour Party to take action on saving our high streets because of the way this Conservative government has failed to take the plight of retail workers seriously.

Thriving town and city centres are vital in providing employment and creating pride in our communities, but up and down the country empty shop windows and rising job losses have been the reality over the past year.

The workers who Usdaw represent are facing low pay, insecure work and the constant threat of job losses. Two-thirds of workers surveyed by Usdaw said that financial worries are harming their mental health and half have missed meals just to pay the bills.

We need a government that does not just stand idly by. We desperately need a comprehensive industrial strategy for retail — and that is what we are seeking the support of Labour conference for. Our members need to be assured that, where the Tories have failed, a Labour government would take retail jobs seriously and provide the necessary support for an industry employing over three million workers.

Usdaw launched our “Save our Shops” to campaign to save Britain’s high streets, protect retail jobs and generate a debate about the long-term future of the sector. We have the full backing of the TUC, having jointly launched the Save our Shops petition with it. This is not just a campaign for shopworkers but for all those who value the shops in their communities and want to do something to turn around our struggling high streets.

In these difficult times when retail faces an uncertain future, it is even more important for shopworkers to join a trade union. Collective organisation of workers gives them the power and the means to protect their jobs, improve their terms and conditions and fight against inequality and exploitation.

Too often, staff in non-unionised workplaces do not have a voice — and when the worst happens, like a closure or redundancies, they are left on the sidelines, ignored by the business. A strong collective voice for workers through their trade union is crucial.

That’s why we welcome Labour’s plan for a new ministry of employment rights under the next Labour government, building on our party’s proud history of improvements to workers’ rights.

We must tackle the anti-union attitude of employers like M&S, Aldi, Lidl and Boohoo, who prevent union reps speaking directly to their staff, intimidate workers who want to join a trade union and shut the door on workers having an independent collective voice.

Instead, we want a society, an economy and a country where workers in shops and warehouses have a real stake and a real voice. This means effective structures for collective bargaining, giving access to the workplace for unions and reducing the artificially high barriers to gaining union recognition. Only with these measures will we truly put power in the hands of workers.

Brexit, the crisis in retail and trade union rights are just three of the many important issues on the agenda of the Labour conference that will hopefully prove to be the launch pad for the campaign to win a Labour government and deliver a better future for workers.