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DERMOT MURNAGHAN: With politicians and the business world still grappling with the outcome of the EU referendum, it’s little wonder that Brexit will dominate the Trade Union Congress which starts today in Brighton.  It comes as the Labour leadership candidate Owen Smith restated his wish for a second referendum and said he wanted Labour to take Britain back into the European Union.  Well he’s not got the backing of many of the big trade unions for his campaign for the leadership but he does have support from the GMB’s Tim Roache and he joins me now from Brighton, a very good morning to you Mr Roache.  You switched sides, your union, when there were all those resignations in the summer for Jeremy Corbyn, you told everyone to get behind him, why have you decided to support Owen Smith?

TIM ROACHE: Well first of all we told people to get behind Jeremy Corbyn because that was the right thing to do, this is a leadership contest that we didn’t want, that nobody wanted at all.  I think it was the wrong move that the Parliamentary Labour Party did but the fact of the matter is Dermot that we are now in a leadership competition and once we were in that situation, the GMB and our members have to be nimble enough to be able to react to that. So what we did, being a democratic member led organisation, we asked our members who we felt was the right person not only to unite the Labour party but also to win power in 10 Downing Street and those who responded, 60% of them felt that that was Owen Smith and I support that.

DM: Ah, what’s your personal view though?  You say you are being led by the membership here, do you still think it’s Mr Corbyn?

TIM ROACHE: No, I think it’s Owen Smith.  I think that’s absolutely clear.  I am the democratically elected leader of a trade union and I take my mandate from my members but I personally believe that as well.  Owen Smith is a fine man with some very good credentials, he is talking about £200 billion investment for British workers, he is talking about ending the pay freeze in the public sector that is so desperately wanted.  These are policies that people unite behind and it is no good us being a protest party, we need to hold this government to account in opposition but also with a firm eye on actually winning power and getting ourselves into 10 Downing Street and changing policies for working people.

DM: But Mr Roache, everything you have said there about Owen Smith’s policies, Mr Corbyn agrees with, he’s said that as well.  Is the difference then just that you think Owen Smith will be more palatable to a wider electorate?

TIM ROACHE: Yes, I think so, I think that’s absolutely right and that’s exactly what the GMB members feel as well. As I’ve said with Jeremy Corbyn we’ve seen he has introduced policies in the Labour party that were so desperately needed, that happened ten months or so ago and if any of the other candidates I think had won at that time Labour would have continued to die by the thousand deaths that they were dying from and people deserting Labour in their droves.  As I said, we didn’t want this Labour leadership competition but the fact of the matter is, once Angela Eagle declared then we were in a competition and that’s when the GMB had to respond and we did so by asking our members.

DM: And as a union, have you put any money into Mr Smith’s campaign?

TIM ROACHE: We will be doing, yes, of course we will, that is exactly what we are supposed to be doing.  The GMB has a political and a campaigning fund and if our members say that we should support a campaign then we put resources to it, it’s not a matter of giving them a blank cheque or huge amounts of money, what we are really doing is working alongside Owen on the campaign trail, in terms of contacting Labour party members and encouraging them to vote for Owen Smith.

DM: Let me talk to you about Brexit and all those discussions that are going to be going on there, already going on in Brighton of course, and this idea – and it is perhaps highlighted by the Foreign Secretary getting involved in a so-called Hard Brexit campaign, that one way for the UK to go is to become a really totally free trading nation, bring all the barriers down and other countries will reciprocate and this way prosperity lies.  Doesn’t that mean that a lot of industries that your members work for would be vulnerable?

TIM ROACHE: I think it does, that’s exactly what it means and that’s why we’re saying as trade unions, and this will be the key debate this week at the Trade Union Congress here in Brighton, that the Conservative party wanted the trade unions on board to advocate a remain and so we were good enough to be on the platform then, so we need to be on the platform now, on the platform now defending workers’ rights because what Brexit can’t mean is that workers, most of them low paid, can pay the price for Brexit.  Europe provided bare minimum basic terms and conditions, things like a guaranteed 20 days holiday, thinks like parental leave, things like health and safety – they should not and will not be on the bargaining or negotiating agenda for employers who want to make a fast buck on the back of using workers.  We will be defending our workers’ rights in every way, shape and form, this cannot be a race to the bottom, Dermot.  

DM: But of course a lot of your members will have voted for Brexit I expect, do you think there are grounds, going back to Mr Smith, there are grounds for a second referendum on this issue?

TIM ROACHE: Frankly no, I don’t, I don’t, I agree with everything that Owen Smith stands for apart from that.  I think that boat has sailed, I think that democracy has determined that we are coming out of Europe and I think the terms and the way and the timing of how we come out of Europe is crucial and that’s why I’ve said the TUC and trade unions like my own, the GMB, should have a seat around that table because we understand the threats and challenges that face 8.2 million people but in terms of a second referendum, no I don’t support that, Dermot, to be honest.  What happens if that vote says to remain, do we have another one and say it’s best of three?  Or another couple, best of five?  That just doesn’t fit with me and I’ve had that discussion with Owen, of course, but the things I do support Owen on, as I’ve said, are an end to the public sector pay freeze, investment in people’s jobs, investment in industry and in the health service that is so desperately creaking, 80% of health service trusts are in deficit at the moment.  Where’s this £350 million a week that was promised by Boris Johnson who is now sitting in the Tory cabinet?  Let’s get that delivered then.

DM: And just lastly, I know there will be discussions down there about this but this idea, this thinking that there are different paths to power, perhaps complementary paths to power for Labour.  Of course the parliamentary route but extra-parliamentary action has a role to play as well?

TIM ROACHE: What do you mean, Dermot?  I don't know where you’re coming from.

DM: Well let’s talk about strikes, demonstrations, putting pressure on the government that way.

TIM ROACHE: Well the pressure we need to put on the government is to get some decent legislation for working people, we need changes in laws, we need absolute bare minimums, things like that the 20 days guaranteed holiday and parental leave and all the stuff that Europe did provide us but doesn’t any longer.  That should be a matter of given in a 21st century country as wealthy as the UK.  We’re talking about pay and equality here as well, Dermot.  The TUC are launching a report this week about pay and equality which shows that one Chief Executive earns the average wage in 45 minutes that our members earn in a year, that’s scandalous.  How is it in 21st century Tory Britain, 2016, that the top 100 people with wealth have the combined wealth of the bottom 19 million?  That inequality is disgusting and it has to be addressed and frankly it’s not wealth that’s trickling down, it’s poverty that’s trickling up.  They are the challenges we are setting for this government but we need to be in government as well and that’s what the issue is about in terms of uniting the Labour party, getting behind whoever wins, the democratic elected leader and then we get on with challenging, holding these Tories to account.  We have seen only this week the Business Minister having a go at businesses, we’ve seen the Health Secretary having a go at doctors, we’ve seen the Foreign Secretary who doesn’t like foreigners, that’s the disarray this government is in and we need to hold them to account.

DM: Okay, good talking to you Mr Roache, thank you very much indeed for your time. Tim Roache there, General Secretary of the GMB.