THIS week I heard an interview on BBC Radio 4's Today programme with Kezia Dugdale, Deputy Leader of Scottish Labour and the favourite to take over from Jim Murphy as leader.

Ms Dugdale correctly identified that one of the keys to a Scottish Labour resurgence is attracting new members.

Ms Dugdale urged people "to join a trade union, to join the Labour Party", and that's the second time I've heard her say exactly that. The order is interesting: first comes union membership, joining the Labour Party trails in a poor second. That suggests Ms Dugdale sees the Labour Party as the political wing of the trade union movement and, if she does, that way lies further decline and defeat.

Trade unions are vital in the workplace. Those who formed them had to fight for decency against callous employers and an often antagonistic state. Many unions have a long and proud history. However, the UK has moved on and unions have struggled to adapt to the changes. There were 13 million union members in 1979; now there's only half that number, with the bulk of them in the public sector.

We've just seen what happens when the trade union barons select Labour's leader and the party strategy is to target its core vote. Scotland, like the rest of the UK, is now diverse, and a good thing that is, too. The traditional Labour voter is no longer present in the numbers of the past and, in Scotland, has largely gone over to the SNP. If a party doesn't have broad appeal, it won't win elections.

I don't know how Labour can escape from the fatal embrace of the big trade unions. After all, it's the big unions who provide the bulk of the party's funding and he who pays the piper, etc. The best hope is that the big unions will recognise that they have to step back, though I accept that's unlikely. Representation in the workplace and political power are separate things and there should be a space between the two.

Of course there are common values shared by the unions and Labour, but I have never understood why unions get so many privileges and so much power within the party. In today's world, it does neither side much good beyond the financial. Labour have a choice: break free or suffer a slow death by suffocation.

Doug Maughan,

58 Menteith View,

Dunblane.