New Model Unions and the Trades Union Congress

From the 1850s skilled workers built stable, well-funded unions known as 'new model unions'. The Amalgamated Society of Engineers, founded in 1851, charged high dues and offered benefits for sickness, unemployment and retirement. These unions preferred negotiation to strikes and sought respectability to win public and political support. In 1868 union representatives met in Manchester for the first Trades Union Congress, creating a national voice for organized labor.

The Trade Union Act of 1871 gave unions legal recognition and protected their funds, and an 1875 law allowed peaceful picketing. Critics, then and later, argued that new model unions represented a 'labor aristocracy' of skilled men and did little for unskilled workers, women or the poorest. Their success nonetheless established unions as a lasting, lawful part of British industrial society.