Template:For Template:Multiple issues Template:Infobox political party Labour Union (Template:Langx, UP) is a minor social-democratic<ref name="BWV"/><ref>Template:Cite book</ref><ref>Template:Cite book</ref> political party in Poland. It was a member of the Party of European Socialists (PES) until April 2022.<ref>2022 Decision taken by the 12th PES Congress, Berlin, 14-15 October 2022.</ref>
HistoryEdit
Template:Missing information Labour Union was formed in June 1992. The party contested the 1993 parliamentary elections, obtaining 7.28% of the popular vote and had 41 representatives elected to the lower house (Sejm). In the following parliamentary elections of 1997, UP received only 4.74% of votes, thereby falling short of the required 5% threshold for election to the Sejm. At the 2001 parliamentary elections, UP entered into an electoral alliance with the major Polish social-democratic party Democratic Left Alliance (SLD), and managed to get 16 of its members elected to parliament. Some of those members subsequently left UP to join the newly created Social Democracy of Poland (SDPL), a splinter group from the SLD. In May 2004, UP signed an alliance with SDPL, in which both parties agreed to jointly contest the following parliamentary elections under the SDPL banner, and to support the candidacy of Marek Borowski in the 2005 presidential election. At the 2005 parliamentary elections, SDPL gained only 3.9% of the vote, which was insufficient for the alliance to achieve parliamentary representation.
In 2006, UP joined SLD, SDPL and the liberal Democratic Party – demokraci.pl to form a centre-left electoral alliance named Left and Democrats (LiD) for the upcoming local elections. This electoral alliance was maintained for the 2007 parliamentary elections, and LiD came in third place with 13.2% of the vote, which saw 53 of its candidates elected to the Sejm. Unfortunately for UP, the party was the only one of the four component parties of the LiD alliance not to have any of its candidates elected.
In the 2011 parliamentary elections, its candidates joined the electoral lists of SLD. Again, none of them were elected.
They managed, however, to win one seat on the European Parliament elections in 2004; the party held it in the elections in 2009 and 2014.<ref name=EPMEPS>European Parliament / MEPs: Adam Gierek.</ref>
In July 2015, the party joined the Zjednoczona Lewica (United Left) electoral alliance for the 2015 parliamentary elections. The alliance received 7.6% vote of the vote in the elections, below the 8% electoral threshold leaving it with no parliamentary representation. The alliance was dissolved in February 2016.
In the 2019 parliamentary election, Labour Union candidates ran on the Civic Coalition’s electoral lists; again, none of their candidates managed to get elected.
Election resultsEdit
PresidentialEdit
| Election | Candidate | 1st round | 2nd round | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| # of overall votes | % of overall vote | # of overall votes | % of overall vote | ||
| 1995 | Tadeusz Zieliński | 631,432 | 3.5 (#6) | ||
| 2000 | Supported Aleksander Kwaśniewski | 9,485,224 | 53.9 (#1) | ||
| 2005 | none | ||||
| 2010 | Supported Grzegorz Napieralski | 2,299,870 | 13.7 (#3) | ||
| 2015 | none | ||||
| 2020 | Waldemar Witkowski | 27,290 | 0.1 (#10) | ||
| 2025 | Magdalena Biejat | 829,361 | 4.23 (#7) | ||
SejmEdit
SenateEdit
| Election | Seats | +/– |
|---|---|---|
| 1993 | Template:Composition bar | New |
| 1997 | Template:Composition bar | Template:Decrease 2 |
| 2001 | Template:Composition bar | Template:Increase 5 |
| As part of the SLD-UP coalition. | ||
| 2005 | Template:Composition bar | Template:Decrease 5 |
| 2007 | Template:Composition bar | Template:Nochange |
| 2023 | Template:Composition bar | Template:Increase 1 |
| As part of Senate Pact 2023. | ||
European ParliamentEdit
| Election | Votes | % | Seats | +/− | EP Group | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2004 | 569,311 | 9.35 (#5) | Template:Composition bar | New | PES | |
| As part of the SLD-UP coalition, that won 5 seats in total. | ||||||
| 2009 | 908,765 | 12.34 (#3) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Steady 0 | S&D | |
| As part of the SLD-UP coalition, that won 7 seats in total. | ||||||
| 2014 | 667,319 | 9.97 (#3) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Steady 0 | S&D | |
| As part of the SLD-UP coalition, that won 5 seats in total. | ||||||
| 2019 | 168,745 | 1.24 (#6) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Decrease 1 | − | |
| As part of the Left Together coalition, that didn't win any seat. | ||||||
| 2024 | 741,071 | 6.30 (#5) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Steady 0 | − | |
| As part of The Left coalition, that won 3 seats in total. | ||||||
Regional assembliesEdit
| Election year | % of vote |
# of overall seats won |
+/– | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1998 | 12.0 (#3) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Increase 89 | |||
| As part of the Social Alliance. | ||||||
| 2002 | 24.6 (#1) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Increase 100 | |||
| As Democratic Left Alliance – Labour Union. | ||||||
| 2006 | 14.2 (#4) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Decrease 123 | |||
| As part of the Left and Democrats. | ||||||
| 2010 | 15.2 (#4) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Increase 19 | |||
| As Democratic Left Alliance – Labour Union. | ||||||
| 2014 | 8.8 (#4) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Decrease 57 | |||
| As part of SLD Lewica Razem. | ||||||
| 2018 | 6.6 (#4) | Template:Composition bar | Template:Decrease 17 | |||
| As part of SLD Lewica Razem. | ||||||
LeadersEdit
Members of European ParliamentEdit
- Adam Gierek (2004–2019)<ref name=EPMEPS/>
Important former membersEdit
- Ryszard Bugaj, left in 1998
- Zbigniew Bujak, until c.1997
- Tomasz Nałęcz, left in 2004 to newly created Social Democracy of Poland
- Aleksander Małachowski, died January 26, 2004
- Izabela Jaruga-Nowacka, left in 2005, founded Union of the Left
ReferencesEdit
External linksEdit
Template:Polish political parties Template:Party of European Socialists Template:Authority control