The Office for National Statistics (ONS) has announced that the number of union members is at the lowest since records originated.
Figures have shown that union membership decreased by 275,000 in 2016, with 66,000 members working in the private sector and 209,000 members working in the public sector, with Union membership decreasing for both men and women.
Responding to the figures, TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady put it down to “cuts in the public sector workforce” and the rise of a gig economy which has effected “good-quality jobs”. Daniel Tomlinson, a researcher at the Resolution Trust, has called on unions to evolve or face becoming “a 20th-century aberration”.
