ED Miliband was told in no uncertain terms that any attempt to downgrade the trade union link with Labour would be resisted and the unions' collective voice would not be "washed away for an electoral gimmick".
The broadside came from GMB leader Paul Kenny, who, speaking on behalf of 14 unions affiliated to Labour, said an interim document by former Labour General Secretary Lord Collins on the planned reforms - including changing the affiliation fee from automatic to voluntary - started, not ended, the process.
"The desire to expand party membership is a shared one but let nobody be under any illusion that as collective organisations, the removal or sale of our collective voice is not on the agenda."
He said the trade unions were not going to accept any advice on democracy and transparency from the "people who brought us the cash for honours scandals or whose activities are funded by cash from wealthy outsiders who refuse to give to the party but prefer to lay cuckoos in CLP nests".
Earlier, the Labour leader made clear there were no plans to change the power of the union block vote in this parliament; the focus was on the "huge change" to affiliation fees.
He also refused to issue an apology for the Falkirk selection fiasco, saying: "No. I don't think anybody can be proud of what happened in Falkirk" and that the party had recognised it needed to change how it worked and that it had "moved on".
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article