I am a member of Unite the Union, the union that now has 2 million members in the UK. I remember listening to the Amicus National Secretary, Derick Simpson, who was giving a speech about the benefits of having a union of Unite's size. One of the primary benefits was the power to lobby the Government effectively. There are a couple of things that we can do -
1. Ballot the membership to find out whether the membership are if favour of ID cards.
2. Take that result to Ms Smith and ask her opinion on that result and what if anything, she is prepared to do?
3. When she ignores it, start looking at a Union co-ordinated protest up to and including removing the money that we give the Labour Party each year.
If each Union affiliated to the TUC did this in a co-ordinated manner in support of the resolution (BALPA) passed this year, she may have to listen.
Or she may not!