Charlie Alford

Unite – no ballots to Gibraltar members as Graham faces international officer rival

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:31 July 2026
Post last modified:31 July 2026

With just twelve days remaining of the Unite general secretary contest, the union has failed to deliver ballots to any of its members in Gibraltar. Incumbent Sharon Graham has been heavily criticised for her treatment of union staff. Her rival in the election is Simon Dubbins, Unite’s international officer. Unite say: ‘tough luck’ An email from the union to Gibraltar members blames Spanish postal services for the non-delivery. And it indicates that, even if members don’t receive ballots in time to post them back to the UK before the 11 August deadline, then tough: Dear Member, GENERAL SECRETARY ELECTION – GIBRALTAR…

Unite disengaged under Graham – MP and EC member come out for Dubbins

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:27 July 2026
Post last modified:28 July 2026

Incumbent general secretary (GS) Sharon Graham‘s disengagement from the politics Unite should be pushing for its members. The cushy cowardice of her paid organisers. These are the reasons a well-known MP and an elected Unite executive (EC) member have cited for calling on Unite members to support challenger Simon Dubbins in Unite’s GS election. The MP Scottish MP Brian Leishman is one of only a handful of Labour MPs to show honour and humanity over Israel’s genocide in Gaza. And Leishman was straightforward in his assessment of the GS contest: under Sharon Graham, Unite is betraying its members by ‘removing itself’…

Graham blows £0.5m of members’ cash in Beckett legal fight and fails

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:17 July 2026
Post last modified:17 July 2026

Unite’s former legal director, Howard Beckett, will have his claims heard at a full hearing after securing an employment appeals tribunal win. Beckett is suing Unite the Union — and current general secretary, Sharon Graham, personally — for breaching his privacy. Yet again Graham’s attempts to have the case thrown out have failed, at a huge cost, as the employment appeals tribunal (EAT) has given permission for all 11 grounds to proceed to hearing. Skwawkbox has previously covered Unite’s attempts to use a technicality against the union’s ex-general secretary candidate. Unite, Howard Beckett and the media pipeline Apart from Skwawkbox and…

Former Sharon Graham election organiser tells Unite members: “Vote Dubbins”

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:17 July 2026
Post last modified:17 July 2026

Unite official Matt Smith played an extensive role in Sharon Graham’s 2021 election campaign to become the union’s general secretary. But in the current general secretary election he is calling on members to back her rival Simon Dubbins for the job. Smith’s commitment to a Graham win was so great that he said “we will all work so hard to get Graham elected as Unite’s next general secretary”: Smith was then promoted in 2022 to Unite’s head of Member Relations: Changed tune But now, after five years of Graham running Unite, Smith has changed his mind completely. Now he has published…

Unite boss Graham accused of collaborating with Streeting to attack Miliband

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:14 July 2026
Post last modified:14 July 2026

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham, who is trying to win re-election this summer, faces yet more alleged scandal. She has been accused by union insiders of collaborating with right-wing, friend-of-Israel MP Wes Streeting to write an attack piece on Ed Miliband. The plan was to “boost” right-winger Streeting’s prospects under incoming PM Andy Burnham. Hatchet job Miliband was tipped to become chancellor when Burnham takes over from lame duck Keir Starmer. However, Starmer’s team, which includes the same people who ran Starmer, is now said to have ‘blocked‘ the appointment. The ‘Reunite the union’ page, run by figures close to the…

Deranged Israel-first senator Graham dies after visit to Ukraine arms factory

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:12 July 2026
Post last modified:12 July 2026

Rabidly Israel-first US senator Lindsey Graham has died aged 71. His office described his death as coming after a “brief and sudden” illness. Graham was one of the more unhinged US politicians, even among Trump supporters. Irredeemably Israel-first, he even threatened a US invasion of the International Criminal Court over its arrest warrant for Benjamin Netanyahu. Lindsey Graham — Shameless genocider Graham was a shameless supporter of Israel’s genocide in Gaza, though he would never have admitted it is a genocide. His comments make clear he had no concern whatsoever for Israel’s hundreds of thousands of Palestinian victims: “I am with…

Another Sharon Graham die-hard asks Unite members to vote for her challenger

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:6 July 2026
Post last modified:6 July 2026

I now need to put right my wrong. These are the words of long-time Unite executive member and union convenor, Steve Hibbert, in a video he has published for the union’s general secretary election. Hibbert campaigned in 2021 for Sharon Graham to become Unite’s general secretary. Now, like fellow former-diehard Dave Williams, he wants union members to support her challenger, Simon Dubbins. Hibbert cites “grave concerns at the actions taken by the union under Sharon” and the “toxic” environment she (and her husband) have created. https://www.thecanary.co/wp-content/uploads/2026/07/Hibbert-Unite-Subbed-hb.mp4 Unite exec member’s video could have been longer Hibbert’s succinct video could have been far,…

Breaking: “You can’t hide” — Dubbins challenges Graham to Unite GS debate

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:4 July 2026
Post last modified:4 July 2026

Unite general secretary election challenger Simon Dubbins has publicly challenged incumbent Sharon Graham to stop hiding from him and debate him directly. The explosive challenge comes after Graham repeatedly sent proxies rather than face Dubbins in person, to the disgust of members — even close allies. While Dubbins attended every hustings to which he was invited, according to Unite insiders Graham didn’t attend a single hustings: As a result, Dubbins gained big wins in huge Unite sectors Graham would previously have considered sewn up tightly, including defence, air travel and construction. Dubbins is also set to win Unite’s ‘Community’ section —…

Die-hard supporter turns publicly on Sharon Graham as Unite election begins

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:1 July 2026
Post last modified:1 July 2026

Dave Williams is a Liverpool-based Unite union stalwart and former member of its executive council. When Skwawkbox writer Steve Walker was chair of a Liverpool constituency Labour party (CLP) in the Corbyn era, Williams was the CLP’s ‘TULO’ (trade union liaison officer). He has also been an ardent supporter of Unite’s general secretary Sharon Graham. And when Skwawkbox started to expose Graham’s failings and misdeeds as Unite general secretary, Williams was highly critical of it doing so. Very highly critical. But now he has, very publicly, changed his tune. With Graham in the middle of a highly-criticised re-election campaign and reeling…

Unite nominations close sees Simon Dubbins win ‘core Graham’ sectors

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:30 June 2026
Post last modified:1 July 2026

Unite leadership challenger Simon Dubbins – the only candidate to consistently oppose Israel’s genocide, UK warmongering, and the union’s withdrawal as a political force – has secured more than enough branch nominations to stand against incumbent Sharon Graham. Not just enough nominations, but nominations in many of the sectors Graham’s supporters would have considered her core support. Graham has outraged Unite members and activists with her support for the arms industry and her opposition to anti-genocide protests. Unite’s war on its workforce, apparently to protect Graham’s husband Jack Clarke, has also disgusted many. Clarke was promoted – outside the union’s usual…

Senior Graham ally deletes ‘blackface’ Facebook post

Post author:Skwawkbox
Post published:25 June 2026
Post last modified:27 June 2026

Scot Walker, a senior and close ally of Unite general secretary Sharon Graham, has deleted an image of himself wearing a beard-and-dreads mask. Walker had posted the image to his Facebook feed, triggering a storm of outrage at the ‘blackface’ get-up: Walker runs Unite’s so-called ‘Workers’ Economy‘, which union insiders have said Graham created to circumvent Unite’s Community section for unwaged members. Unite Community was set up by her predecessor Len McCluskey, whom Graham has long attacked with what McCluskey called “pages of smears and innuendo”. Union members and staff said that Graham planned to shut down Community if she wins…

Deranged US Senator Graham is keeping his Abraham Accords dream alive

Post author:The Canary
Post published:19 June 2026
Post last modified:19 June 2026

Zionist Republican Senator Lindsey Graham continued to post on X that the expansion of the Abraham Accords and normalizing relations between Saudi Arabia and Israel is his and Trump’s ultimate goal. He said he had a fruitful conversation with fellow envoy Steve Witkoff According to Graham, the MOU with Iran is just the first step. He wants to use it as a way to eventually expand the Abraham Accords and get Saudi Arabia to normalize relations with Israel. Announced in 2020, these accords established diplomatic relations between Israel and several Arab states, beginning with the United Arab Emirates (UAE) and Bahrain.…

Unite’s Graham pines for Healey exit

Post author:The Canary
Post published:12 June 2026
Post last modified:13 June 2026

Unite — Sharon Graham’s call for looser fiscal rules to fund military spending was slammed by Stop the War’s officer, Shabbir Lakha. Graham was mourning the resignation of John Healey as defence secretary, who resigned citing Starmer and his chancellor, Rachel Reeves, as not ‘serious’ enough about spending huge amounts of our money on military build-up. Lakha pointed out that the government is already cutting 1% of all capital budgets to pay for this defence hike, and that Healey resigned to demand even more. He slammed her, as the leader of one of the biggest unions in the country, for actively…