Meet the TUC President, Matt Wrack
Written for the Congress Guide 2024, by Press Association industrial correspondent, Alan Jones.
Matt is the General Secretary at the Fire Brigades Union (FBU), and the chair of TUC’s General Council and Executive Committee. She is TUC President 2023-24.
Few TUC presidents could have enjoyed such a momentous year in office as Fire Brigades Union (FBU) general secretary Matt Wrack.
During his 12 months at the helm of the TUC, hundreds of thousands of union members have been striking for better pay and conditions, and Labour has formed its first government for 14 years.
It couldn’t have been a more fitting moment for the movement to be led by this longtime union firebrand (pun definitely intended).
After gaining a reputation as a troublemaking teenager while attending his first union meetings as a 17-year-old, Matt joined the London Fire Brigade at the age of 21, becoming an FBU branch secretary a year later.
After supporting his members in various roles, including 17 years on the union’s London regional committee, he won election as general secretary in May 2005.
Now deep into his second decade at the head of the FBU, Matt has won renewed respect and admiration during his term in office as TUC president.
His support for industrial action has helped achieve a series of victories for unions, including his own. And his trademark powerful speeches at rallies and appearances on picket lines have sent a strong message of solidarity from the TUC.
Looking back over the past 12 months, Matt believes one of the biggest achievements of the TUC and its affiliated unions has been in helping the Labour Party draw up the New Deal for working people.
In addition to securing this sea change in workers’ rights, which will tackle exploitative zero hours contracts and the shameful growth of fire and rehire policies, unions have also successfully pressed Labour to repeal the controversial law on minimum levels of service during strikes.
Labour’s landslide victory in the general election has given unions huge hope that the days of being ignored by the government are over.
An Employment Bill was included in the King’s Speech, taking forward measures in the New Deal painstakingly drawn up alongside unions over the past few years.
There are big opportunities for trade unions now to achieve real improvements in pay and conditions as well as how we are allowed to function in the workplace.
“Repealing the 2016 Trade Union Act and the minimum services legislation are significant steps forward. We will have to keep the pressure on the government, keep campaigning and make sure we are kept up to speed on the details of the Employment Bill, so that we see the government is delivering on its pledges for workers.” says Matt.
But he also sees great opportunities ahead now. “I firmly believe that after such a huge outbreak of industrial action, particularly in the public sector, confidence in the movement will be rebuilt and we will see an improvement in wages and terms of employment,” he says.
“We need to be saying to Labour that after 14 years of pay restraint, they must address the question of wages and living standards.”
Matt hasn’t held back from expressing his views on political as well as industrial issues as TUC President, especially over the conflict in Gaza.
Alongside other union leaders he has pressed for a ceasefire and is proud to have introduced the Palestinian ambassador
to the UK, Husam Zomlot, to address a meeting of the TUC General Council earlier this year.
He also lists another achievement as chairing a special TUC conference at the end of last year to discuss fighting the minimum services legislation, believing that the strength and unity of union opposition helped shape Labour’s pledge to repeal the law.
Matt hasn’t shied away from internal issues some unions have faced this year, admitting there have been some “very difficult
discussions”. But he strongly believes that discrimination and harassment of any kind must be tackled if unions are to be genuinely inclusive.
He admits that being president of the TUC puts huge demands on time, with a busy day job as head of the FBU. The union has faced attacks on pay, pensions and jobs as well as ‘reforms’ to the fire service that the FBU believes have undermined firefighters’ response to emergency calls. The union has also played a prominent role in calling for justice for the victims of the Grenfell Tower fire.
In all his work, Matt demands high standards from colleagues and other union general secretaries. On taking over as TUC president, Matt made it clear that the meetings he chaired would finish on time, and speakers would keep their language civil.
Some might think asking general secretaries to be brief, and not slip in the odd swear word, was a near impossible ask. But a mixture of Matt’s seriousness, coupled with a light-hearted way of conducting business to avoid any drudgery in meetings, always won him respect.
Union gatherings he has addressed this year include the Durham Miners’ Gala and the Tolpuddle Festival, two very different events, but both reflecting the traditions of the union movement.
He was particularly moved to lead the march through the small Dorset village of Tolpuddle, basking in the sunshine and history of the beginnings of trade union action, alongside TUC general secretary Paul Nowak, who has also played a crucial role this year in supporting unions in dispute. The two men epitomise the very best in leadership, activism and solidarity.
Matt believes the TUC should be proud of its achievements in 2024, helping to herald a new era of improved workers’ rights.
On being elected president last year, he said workers were hungry for an alternative to the Conservative government’s “toxic cocktail of authoritarianism, bigotry and attacks on our right to strike.”
Twelve months later, Matt thinks it’s time for change: “I think we are at a turning point,” he says.
He’s not a troublemaking teenager anymore, but Matt will definitely be maintaining the pressure on Labour to deliver the New Deal that unions and workers desperately need.