Here’s a story from last week (have been PC-free this last weekend). John Monks, General Secretary of the ETUC (and former GS of the TUC) was in town to give the annual Bevan Lecture, entitled “The Challenge of the New Capitalism”.

His speech is online and is well worth a read (as is Stefan Stern’s commentary in the FT). I’ve always respected him as one of the UK’s foremost thinkers on unions and industrial relations, so it was a shock to read (I didn’t make it to the lecture) a very frank discussion of his doubts about the nature of new forms of capitalism and the prospects for a fair system of partnership.

Capitalism has been changing behind the scenes, Monks argues. The world of finance, particularly high risk finance schemes like hedge funds, is upsetting the partnership dynamic between workers and business owners, both of whom had an interest in the sustainable operation of the firm. Now with investors changing hands at a moment’s notice, much of the capital no longer has an interest in the actual business of the company, only in making a gambler’s fast buck. How can you enter into partnership with owners who aren’t even in the game for a period of weeks, let alone years? The results range from companies which collapse at a moment’s notice, to those which run down, split and sell their own firms, skimping on R&D and treating personnel as a resource to be bought in and laid off without responsibility, as happened at Gate Gourmet.

The answers are still harder, Monks admits, and need brave action by our business owners, government and the EU. We should stop treating speculative finance as a special case industry – it still makes us far less money than exports- and we need to look at new ways of funding R&D and exposing corporate wrong-doing. Unions are very much part of the picture too. We need to form better international links, and really expand our activity on shareholder action (through our pensions, we mini-capitalists own huge chunks of companies, and can have a big voice in decisions). John Monks has laid down a challenge to all of us (himself included) that goes to the heart of our thinking on industrial relations. Uncomfortable but essential reading.