The Graphical, Paper and Media Union (GPMU) was a trade union in the United Kingdom and the Republic of Ireland between 1992 and 2005. Having been formed from the merger of SOGAT and the National Graphical Association, it claimed to be the world's largest media union, and had over 200,000 members working in the print, publishing, paper, IT and media industries. The sole General Secretary of the GPMU was Tony Dubbins, the Deputy General Secretary of the GPMU was Tony Burke.
Facing a decline in membership, in February 2004, GPMU opened merger negotiations with Amicus. In August 2004, results of a ballot of all members were released, showing 86% of members in favour of merger. The formal merger took place in early 2005, and GPMU became the semi-autonomous Graphical, Paper and Media industrial sector of Amicus. Tony Dubbins became the Deputy General Secretary of Amicus and Tony Burke became Assistant General Secretary of Amicus. Tony Dubbins was also the Chair of TULO. He retired in October, 2008.
Amicus merged with the Transport & General Workers Union in May 2007 to form Unite the Union. The GPMU sector became the Graphical, Paper & Media Sector of Unite the union.
Tony Burke is now the Assistant General Secretary of Unite responsible for the union's manufacturing section.
Famous quotes containing the words paper, media and/or union:
“The drama critic on your paper said my chablis-tinted hair was like a soft halo over wide set, inviting eyes, and my mouth, my mouth was a lush tunnel through which golden notes came.”
—Samuel Fuller (b. 1911)
“The media have just buried the last yuppie, a pathetic creature who had not heard the news that the great pendulum of public conciousness has just swung from Greed to Compassion and from Tex-Mex to meatballs.”
—Barbara Ehrenreich (b. 1941)
“The rage for road building is beneficent for America, where vast distance is so main a consideration in our domestic politics and trade, inasmuch as the great political promise of the invention is to hold the Union staunch, whose days already seem numbered by the mere inconvenience of transporting representatives, judges and officers across such tedious distances of land and water.”
—Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882)