EXCLUSIVE: Man who wrote Sharon Graham’s first Unite manifesto now supports challenger

Sharon Graham’s former Unite election campaign organiser Matt Smith now supports her opponent, Simon Dubbins.

Having seen Graham in action as general secretary, Smith believes that another five years of Graham would be “an utter disaster for our union”.

But he didn’t only play an extensive role in her 2021 general secretary election campaign. According to senior union insiders, he “wrote her manifesto”.

Unite endured five misused years under Graham

Smith said that Graham has increased corruption at Unite rather than reduce it. He claimed that she had appointed useless cronies to senior positions and even made up a “ghost job” to buy off a potential rival.

Smith said:

[Graham had] shown all the signs of being insecure, paranoid, and suffering from imposter syndrome from the very start of her term.

Rather than progress Unite, Graham “wasted five years that should have been used to turn this union around”, Smith added.

As the person who wrote her manifesto, who could be better placed to know that she squandered the time instead of implementing her promises?

Smith also left out a lot of Graham’s appalling, anti-union record. For more detail on that, read this.

Featured image via Nurith Wagner-Strauss