What are trade unions?

Trade unions are organisations that represent people at work. Their purpose is to protect and improve people's pay and conditions of employment. They also campaign for laws and policies which will benefit working people.

Trade unions exist because an individual worker has very little power to influence decisions that are made about his or her job. By joining together with other workers, there is more chance of having a voice and influence.

All sorts of jobs and industries are covered by trade unions. Some unions represent people who do a particular job or work in a specific industry - for example, the National Union of Journalists (NUJ), as its name suggests, represents journalists, and the Union for Finance Staff (UNIFI) is made up of people who do different jobs in the financial sector.

Other unions include a mixture of people in different jobs and sectors. The biggest unions in Britain - the GMB, UNISON and the Transport and General Workers Union (TGWU) represent people working in a range of different occupations and industries in the public and private sectors. Often this is because unions have merged with other unions so that they can increase their membership and their influence.

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