Adult Education, Trade Unions and Unemployment

Trade unions traditionally have been associated with the world of work, but there has been a major separation between work-based and home-based organizations. As a corollary, where education has been a major activity for trade unions (or at least within their sphere of influence) it has not usually included education for unwaged people. This article examines part of the trade unions' response to unemployment in Britain, and illustrates the role, process, and outcomes of a national adult education action-research program working with the Trade Union Congress Centres for the Unemployed. Although such centres are not unique to Britain, they are a more extensive and developed response to long-term structural unemploy- ment by trade unions than is perhaps evident elsewhere.