Len McCluskey

Leonard David "Len" McCluskey (born 23 July 1950) is an English trade unionist who has been the General Secretary of Unite since 2011. He previously spent some years working on the Liverpool Docks prior to becoming a full-time union official.

Early life

McCluskey was born in Liverpool and went to the Cardinal Godfrey School in Everton. After leaving school as a teenager, he went to work for the Mersey Docks and Harbour Company and remained there for the next 11 years.

Trade unionist

McCluskey first became a trade unionist in 1968, while working on the docks. He became a shop steward a year later, aged 19, and joined the Labour Party in 1970. He became an officer of the TGWU in Merseyside in 1979 and was its campaign organiser throughout the 1980s, during which he supported Militant tendency, but was not a member of it.

McCluskey was elected as the National Secretary of the TGWU General Workers Group in 1990, and moved to London to work in the union's national headquarters. In 2004 he became the TGWU's national organiser for the service industries. In 2007, he was appointed as the Assistant General Secretary for Industrial Strategy of the newly merged Unite the Union. He defines himself as being on the left of the union, and has been given the label of "Red Len" in the British press because of his involvement in Unite's dispute with British Airways.