EXCLUSIVE: Supporters of union activists disciplined for a “racist” leaflet depicting Unison leaders as the three wise monkeys have expressed their shock after the four lost their appeals and tribunals.

Glenn Kelly, Onay Kasab, Suzanne Muna and Brian Debus, all members of the Socialist Party, were stripped of their branch roles for publishing a leaflet accusing the union’s Standing Orders Committee of a policy of “hear no evil, see no evil, speak no evil” after a series of motions to its annual conference were ruled out of order.

Objections were raised two days after their intervention on the grounds the chair of the committee, Clytus Williams, is black. The four have now been banned from holding office in Unison for five years.

Susanne Beishon of Hackney Socialist Party has been active in the campaign to support Brian Debus, who was Unison branch chair in the borough.  She said: “We were surprised by quite how brutal the wording of the tribunal was, saying that the leaflet was ‘repugnant and not worthy or a democratic society,’ it just shows how much they wanted the four out.

“There is another tribunal pending over whether challenging the Standing Orders Committee was out of order, but the legal angle is out of the picture now.

“All the branches affected are planning to protest outside their workplaces shortly after the mitigation phase, where they try and reduce the sentence, finishes at the end of February.

“There’s a lot of anger about this, I was at the Hackney Unison AGM recently and everyone was up in arms against the national leadership.”

The timing of the condemnation at conference, after the four had been suspended pending a further investigation, meant that they were unable to respond or apologise for any unintentional offence caused. This, combined with the dropping of related charges against Matthew Waterfall – who is not a Socialist Party member – has led to accusations that Unison’s leadership is trying to neuter left wing opposition. Supporters of the four have pointed to examples in which the union itself has used the three wise monkeys formula and failed to punish more serious offences.

In its own article on the issue, the Socialist Party noted: “Tellingly Chris Remington (Unison head of health for London) was quoted as saying that the “trots” had to be ‘castigated.’ This is evidence of Unison not only giving a clear line to full-time officials to witch-hunt union activists but it also calls them onto courses designed for this purpose.”

Union members have also criticised the cost of the hearings, which is rumoured to have reached a quarter of a million pounds over the last two years.