I too am in a union where I work and they dont seem to have much clout. I can never quite forget that the company is paying the wages of the union reps that we have and when it comes to crunchtime for whatever be it wage rises etc the union always seem to agree with the company in the end. I am sure that my union is simply humoured by my firm to be seen to be doing the done thing.(the firm that is!). They're subscription I also notice seems to be creeping up towards the 10 pound a month mark too but we never seem to get any notification of this. I think I am going to unsubscribe because lets face it, if my company makes me redundant theres not a lot the union can do!