News Release

Embargo: not for publication or broadcast before 00:01 am Saturday 13 May

Research uncovers reasons for further union decline in the 1990s

Union representation in British workplaces suffered a debilitating decline in the 1990s. Among private sector workplaces with 25 or more employees, the proportion with recognised unions fell from two fifths to just one quarter. And in workplaces where unions retained a role, they negotiated on behalf of fewer workers. Lower membership levels and lack of recognition in new workplaces were the principal causes of the fall in union representation. If those factors persist, they herald a further contraction in the present decade.

These conclusions are based on a welter of evidence from the authoritative Workplace Industrial Relations Survey series. They appear today in a book, All Change at Work?, written by analysts from two of Britain’s leading independent research organisations: PSI and the National Institute for Economic and Social Research (NIESR). The book’s authors consider that last year’s Employment Relations Act - with its new statutory union recognition procedure - will not, on its own, fulfil union hopes and reverse the decline in union representation highlighted by the research.

The research also revealed that employees are now less inclined to union membership, even where management still supports it. In this less unionised environment, employers increasingly communicate directly with their employees – using forums such as workforce meetings and team briefings – channels which lack independence and are also shown to be less durable.

Dr Neil Millward, the book’s senior author, comments, "On the evidence provided by these national, statistical surveys, the prospect is for a further disintegration of the remaining system of joint regulation and employee voice based on trade union representation. We (the authors of this report) expect the economy to continue to generate more workplaces in which the nature of the employment relationship is almost exclusively a matter for managerial choice."

Notes to Editors:

1. All Change at Work? by Neil Millward, Alex Bryson and John Forth is published by Routledge, priced £20 paperback or £60 hardback.
2. The research was based upon the Workplace Industrial Relations Surveys of 1980, 1984 and 1990 and the Workplace Employee Relations Survey of 1998. Each of the surveys involved interviews with managers in approximately 2000 workplaces employing 25 or more employees, with response rates of around 80 per cent. The 1998 survey also collected questionnaires from over 28,000 employees, a response rate of nearly 65 per cent. The surveys were funded by the Department of Trade and Industry, the Economic and Social Research Council, the Advisory, Conciliation and Arbitration Service and the Policy Studies Institute and conducted by the National Centre for Social Research.
3. The analysis contained in All Change at Work? was made possible by a grant to Dr Millward from the Leverhulme Trust and carried out at the Policy Studies Institute and the National Institute of Economic and Social Research. The views expressed by the authors do not necessarily represent the position of any of the four sponsors of the 1998 Workplace Employee Relations Survey or its predecessors.