Conflict of Interest

One of the earliest times I got into trouble in the Local was on the issue of conflict of interest.
Pissed off the powers that be!
One of my committee members wanted to sell issue specific items to our committee.
I felt that was a conflict of interest. Although the potential existed for this member to come up with all kinds of proposals to sell other gee-gaws to our committee, the truth of it simply was that I do not believe that a rep ought to financially benefit from a union position.
A personal opinion, just that!
I felt that the member should make a choice. Either be a committee member or a peddler who sold it gee-gaws. I felt that it would be conflict of interest if the member wanted to do both.
The Locals leadership had never heard of the term before and believed that I had made it up. They felt that I must have a "personality conflict" ( a term that continues to affect service to our members) with the member and that I should just shut and accept past practice.
I was acclaimed "troublemaker" of the year....that year!

Examples of conflict of interest;
1) Having an appointee as a trustee is a conflict of interest. The appointee is put in the position of auditing his/her political superiors actions.
Perception is that such a trustees independence to make decisions on behalf of the membership is compromised.

1B) Which leads to; Trustees should not take part in Executive Board decisions. They should not be made to review their own decisions. If they do so, can they be properly objective?
Fulfill their fiduciary responsibilities knowing full well they participated in the decisions they are being asked to audit?
Trustees should work independently from the Executive Board and meet with them only to report audit results or on Trustee specific issues.

2) The son/daughter/relative of an office holder cannot be "Election Chairperson" or for that matter be a member of an election committee.
This leads to all kinds of negative perceptions and accusations and damages the credibility of the electoral process and many innocent election committee members for generations to come.

3) If an officer or leader is forced to give up an assignment because he/she has so many relatives working in one location, that the leader/officer cannot properly represent them, then that officer/leader cannot again run for the same position or any position that involves that particular unit or workplace in the future. We should be especially mindful of this because we are an industry that uses the preferential hiring system and thus have many relatives as co-workers. Its a potential minefield in many many ways that are yet to manifest themselves.
Matter-of-fact if we had such by-laws they would have had to resign from office immediately, due to conflict of interest.

These are but three examples of what constitutes a conflict of interest. This is a topic that can and should, in a democratic institution, be debated for as long as even the possibility of improper influence exists. Far more damaging than improper influence is the cronyism that sometimes develops among long-serving members, that adversely affects membership services.
Debate leads to action. Conflict of interest by-laws set strict guidelines to help avoid these minefields.
To deflate the use of the old tried, tested and much used cliches such as , "Personality conflict" and "sour grapes" that our current leadership uses when their actions are criticized or even questioned, I want to make this statement. This is not about criticizing individuals-This is about reforming a system.
This is not about criticizing any individual or about trying to get at any individual. It's simply abour fixing a system that continually produces crisis and division.
This is simply about getting the best possible service for dues paying members.