December 1998 Volume 79 Number 12 "serving the protectors"
Police Unionism - Texas Style
By Brett Williams

Australian police associations must become feared and disliked in political circles, an American union leader has warned.

CLEAT (Combined Law Enforcement Associations of Texas) president, Ron DeLord, told PASA’s annual conference in Adelaide recently that police unionists too often wanted politicians to like them.

“All politicians have two things in common: they want to get elected, and they want to stay elected. All other things (to them) are immaterial,” DeLord told his captivated audience of PASA delegates.

“(So) you would be better off organizationally to have them all have a little bit of fear in their hearts over you.

“Bargaining, many times, is not at the four corners of the table - it’s fought out politically.”

DeLord also urged delegates to participate in the political process and win the respect of those in government. But power, he said, was the most crucial element of effective police unionism.

“There is no purpose for the Police Association of South Australia except the accumulation of power,” he insisted. “If you’re not powerful, you get nothing. And political action builds that power.

“Politicians only do what they are forced to do. You have to be prepared to force them to do the right thing. They will not do it on their own.”

And DeLord said that those who weren’t participating in the political process were “only observers”.

Himself a former police officer, DeLord, 50, is recognized throughout the United States as a leading authority on police industrial relations.

He holds degrees in law and criminal justice and co-authored the book Police Association Power, Politics and Confrontation - A Guide for the Successful Police Labor Leader.

DeLord has developed CLEAT into a high-powered, multimillion-dollar organization, of which he has served eight three-year terms as president. CLEAT employs over 40 solicitors and its membership exceeds 17,000.

During his three-hour address, DeLord encouraged an “in-your-face” style of political lobbying. He insisted that the more traditional practice of rallying outside parliament buildings was essentially ineffective.

“They (politicians) are looking out the window, but they know you are going to leave; that it’ll hurt for a minute and you’ll be gone,” DeLord said.

Confronting politicians personally and “getting inside their space” are the methods which DeLord said would command their attention. He stressed the need to make them accountable, even to the point of public embarrassment when necessary.

“Things tend to get settled when people start getting uncomfortable; when it starts affecting their lives or their political future,” he said.

He also suggested that politicians should be made to “pay a price” for failing in any commitments they’d made to police.

DeLord demonstrated his strategies to the conference with video tapes of CLEAT-made television commercials used in various campaigns. Each contained graphic, emotional footage of injured officers left incapacitated, and interviews with slain officers’ family members.

Another video showed DeLord interjecting at a police chief’s press conference.

Police Association president, Peter Alexander, agreed that Australian police associations needed to be “more up-front”. He said that in representing others’ interests, unionists had to be successful rather than popular.

“I have no difficulty with that ‘in-your-face’ approach,” he said. “Politicians are ‘in your face’ in terms of wanting your vote - why wouldn’t we be ‘in their faces’ about what we want them to do in Parliament.

“It’s all too convenient to say that we shouldn’t do it because it lacks decorum, (but) our people’s interests and safety are more important than protocol.”

Visiting Australia at the invitation of the Police Federation of Australia, DeLord also addressed police union conferences in Sydney and Hobart. He said that he hoped his lectures would help Australian police union officials sharpen their skills and refocus on their “fundamental mission”.

He insisted, however, that his Australian colleagues must move to “the next level” of police unionism, and added: “They’re either going to do it, or they’ll not get what they want.”