Unite boss to face leadership challenge amid concerns over rise of Reform

Simon Dubbins to announce he has secured required number of nominations to challenge Sharon Graham

Sharon Graham, the leader of the UK’s second biggest union, Unite, is to face a challenge as general secretary over claims the union is not doing enough to challenge the rise of Reform UK .

Simon Dubbins, who started out as a print worker and has been an international director with the union since 2008, will announce on Tuesday that he has secured the required number of nominations to mount a challenge.

Graham was criticised by some within the union movement last week for her attack on the energy secretary, Ed Miliband, and his net zero agenda, which she said would be a “ noose around the neck ” of job creation. She supports more drilling for fossil fuels in the North Sea.

A senior trade union source said there was widespread unease that Graham’s anti-Miliband, pro-drilling stance played into the hands of Reform’s leader, Nigel Farage. “[Graham’s] interventions are boosting Farage and his crypto backers. And her attack on Ed played right into the hands of the Labour right,” the source said.

Unite has members in almost every sector of the economy and Dubbins’ team say they have the backing of more than 250 workplaces, including some of the union’s largest branches.

Dubbins said: “Our campaign for a new start for our union has won overwhelming backing from our organised membership in half the usual time. Members are tired of old divisions and frustrated with a leadership more obsessed with playing political games than stopping job losses and the attacks we face.”

Dubbins said the growth in the popularity of Reform, including among union members , was one of the most pressing political issues facing working people. He said Unite had failed to do enough to challenge the party and had a “unique responsibility to heal divisions, win workers back from the false promises of Farage, and ultimately stop a Reform government”.

“Reform will never be on the side of working people. From council workers to migrant workers, our members are under attack. Our union will defend you and we will take the fight to Reform and the far right,” he said.

On North Sea oil and gas, Dubbins said workers could not “be abandoned as the Vauxhall Luton workers were or the miners were before them”. He said the transition to a low-carbon economy needed to secure jobs and livelihoods, adding: “We are sceptical of any plan that does not start with that.”

But he argued that the fast-growing green economy was key to securing well-paid, long-term unionised jobs for Unite members, and he pointed to his involvement in a campaign at Luton Vauxhall in 2024 where industrial workers and climate groups came together to defend jobs as a template for future campaigns.

“That is the unity we need to build on to win a genuine workers’ transition that safeguards jobs. I’m very proud to be nominated by union branches of refinery and manufacturing workers as well as those working to tackle climate change,” he said.

There has been an ongoing debate about who will be made chancellor if, as expected, Andy Burnham becomes prime minister. Graham’s attack on Miliband was seen as a tacit endorsement of his rival Wes Streeting. But Dubbins’ team say he would only back politicians with a track record of supporting unions and workers, which they say rules Streeting out.

Ballots will be dispatched to more than 1 million Unite members on 14 July. Voting will end on 11 August and the result is expected to be announced on 14 August.