A week after Miliband's pledge to reduce union influence, the GMB boast of their Parliamentary power

By Mark Wallace
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Despite its practical flaws, Ed Miliband's speech on Labour's union links appears to have put off his party's crisis on the subject for now. The obscure nature of the proposals, combined with a clever attempt to bounce the issue back onto the Conservatives, mean that the scandal has simmered down.

But it hasn't gone away. While he carefully avoided committing himself to a timetable, at some point the press will expect to see results - and the unions are going to start squealing if he does take meaningful action to prevent their takeover attempts.

A measure of the unions' commitment to their campaign comes in the summer edition of the GMB's in-house magazine (which bizarrely appears to have stolen its logo design from Heat and Nuts). The London edition is called Candid - and it lives up to the name.

On page 11, GMB General Secretary Paul Kenny attacks Parliament, calling it a "phoney democracy". And he should know - on the very next page is a spread headlined "Look at our success", profiling those GMB members who have successfully been selected as Labour candidates and promoting the union's "political education" programme for new members:

(Click the image to enlarge)

To be clear, the candidates making "inroads into Parliament" whom the piece celebrates are the products of the very programme of union entryism that Ed Miliband told us last week will be nipped in the bud. He might really intend to deal with it - but if so, he'll be going head to head with the unions over a project they are clearly very proud of.