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Police Involvement in Blacklisting

10th November 2014

Police Involvement in Blacklisting

Subject : Full text of letter John McDonnell MP sent to Teresa May

Dear Home Secretary,
Re: Police Involvement in Blacklisting
When the Prime Minister announced the setting up of the Leveson I asked him to set up an inquiry into the blacklisting of workers that had been exposed by the raids on the offices of the Consulting association by the Information Commissioner. I was particularly concerned at the allegation that the Police and Intelligence Services had been implicated in the practice of blacklisting trade unionists. See my intervention as recorded in Hansard on the 21st March 2012, ‘The Information Commissioner has confirmed that some of the information used by the Consulting Association to blacklist trade unionists could only have come from the police or the Security Service. When 3,000 people, mostly celebrities, had their telephones hacked, the Government set up an inquiry under Leveson. When 3,200 trade unionists have been blacklisted, and many have lost their livelihoods, the Home Secretary simply suggests that they go to the Independent Police Complaints Commission. Why is there one route to justice for celebrities, and another for working people?
At that stage the Prime Minister was not willing to establish an inquiry into blacklisting but assured me that any evidence of this practice would be investigated.
I am writing to you to bring to your attention a serious piece of evidence that has emerged confirming Police involvement in the role of the blacklisting organisation, the Consulting Association.
It is a handwritten note taken by the late Mr Ian Kerr, chief executive of the Consulting Association, of a meeting organised by the Consulting Association and addressed by Detective Chief Inspector Gordon Mills from the National Extremism Tactical Co-ordination Unit (NECTU)
The note describes the Powerpoint presentation given by the police officer to representatives from the following companies: Vinci, AMEC, Skanska, Costain, Sir Robert McAlpine, Emcor, and Sias Building Services.
Given this record of attendance at this meeting, it is shocking that in their evidence to the Scottish Select Committee’s inquiry into blacklisting directors of Skanska and Sir Robert McAlpine denied any involvement of the police.
DCI Mills was head of Police Liaison at NECTU and it is alleged that his role was to provide information from the Police to companies.
NECTU was subsequently subsumed into the National Domestic Extremism Unit of the Metropolitan Police but despite numerous requests under the Freedom of Information Act for documents relating to NECTU’s activities, the response has been that no documents relating to the meeting of DCI Mills with the Consulting Association exist. It appears odd that no report of such an important meeting was written and that no evidence of the meeting is now held by the Metropolitan Police.
In the light of this recent evidence implicating the Police in the blacklisting of trade unionists and others, I am writing to you to request you to intervene to ensure not only that all the documentation relating to NECTU’s relationship with the Consulting Association is put in the public domain but also that an independent inquiry is now undertaken into the role of the Police and Intelligence Services in blacklisting in this country over the last 40 years.
I would welcome a prompt reply.
Yours,

John McDonnell MP