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Last updated: 16/07/09

Professor Sonia McKay

Position

Professor of European Socio-Legal Studies

Qualifications

  • LL.B (Queens University, Belfast)
  • Ph.D (Wolfson College, Cambridge)

Background/Career

Sonia came to the Working Lives Research Institute from the Labour Research Department (LRD), the independent trade union-based research organisation, where she held the post of employment law researcher from 1983 until 2004. At LRD, she undertook a large number of commissioned research projects mainly for trade union organisations. Between 1993 and 1994, during a period of sabbatical leave from LRD, she worked with the late Professor Brian Bercusson at the European Institute in Florence, on a project examining the implications of the Maastrict Treaty on collective bargaining. In 2002 and 2003 she also taught part-time at London Metropolitan University, teaching Industrial Relations Law to undergraduates in the Business School as well as teaching a post graduate Labour Law course.

After a law degree at Queens, Belfast Sonia completed a Ph.D at Cambridge with a thesis on disciplinary penalties against strikers. She then worked for Thomas Cook the travel company, where through union activity, was elected as a representative on the union national negotiating body. From 1975 until 1982 she worked for the travel and rail union TSSA, first in its recruitment and organising department, moving to work in the departments responsible for railway staff in the London Midland Region, the docks and hotels sector and finally working in the national negotiations department. Having left TSSA to travel round South East Asia, (during which time she taught a short course on UK employment law at the University of Srinigar) Sonia returned to take up the post at LRD.

Sonia is currently working on five major projects at the Working Lives Research Institute. The first is a Framework Six Programme funded project, where she is co-ordinating a seven-country partnership looking at the experiences of undocumented migrants. A second, is a project funded by DG Employment at the European Commission. In co-operation with the trade unions at European level, this 35-country study, co-ordinated by WLRI, will map trade union policies and practices in combatting discrimination. A third current project has been commissioned by the Royal College of Nurses and islooking at the benefits of trade union recognition in the health sector. Sonia is also the co-ordinator of the EU Level team for the observatories of the European Foundation for Living and Working Conditions. She has also been appointed as an academic peer reviewer on the Inquiry into deaths in the construction sector. Sonia has been a trade union activist all of her working life. She has held branch and regional office, was a delegate to the GMB union conference on a number of occasions and for some years was President of the union section representing trade union and political staffs. Sonia has been a trade union activist all of her working life. She has held branch and regional office, was a delegate to the GMB union conference on a number of occasions and for some years was President of the union section representing trade union and political staffs.

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Research interests

Sonia’s research interests include the impact of institutional racism on the workplace, migrant workers, industrial action and the law, trade union recognition and de-recognition, the role of the judiciary in industrial disputes, collective issues in employment law, professional and managerial staff and equal opportunities in a work environment.

Sonia has carried out a number of research projects for the TUC, including its annual Trade Union Trends reports (on new union recognition deals, employment tribunals, industrial action and industrial action ballots and legal action against unions). In the last few years she has carried out commissioned research for the public services’ union UNISON on institutional racism, with surveys of employers in the public sector, trade union branches, union activists and UNISON black members.

 

Contact details

s.mckay@londonmet.ac.uk

Working Lives Research Institute
London Metropolitan University
31 Jewry Street
London EC3N 2EY
Tel. 020 7320 1382

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Publications

Books

Book Chapters

Journal articles

Other publications

Reports

Invited & other academic conference papers

  • 2004. Nailing blancmange to the ceiling?’ The conclusion and content of collective bargaining agreements emerging from statutory trade union recognition, BUIRA conference July 2004. with Dr Sian Moore and Hannah Wood
  • 2004. How effective are labour codes, European University of Work, Nantes August 2004
  • 2001. Atypical work, New Developments in the Labour Law of the European Union, Academy of European Law, Trier.
  • 2001. The implementation of the Fixed-term contracts directive in the UK, Academy of European Law, Trier.
  • 2001. Collective Bargaining and Institutional Racism, University of North London.
  • 2001. Invited discussant in session on ‘The Nature and Function of Fundamental Social Rights’ at a conference on Fundamental Social Rights, University of Cambridge.
  • 2000. Activism at work: gender bargaining agendas’ Women, Work and Trade Unions Seminar Series 1999/2000, Women, diversity and democracy in trade unions.
  • 2000. Trade union recognition in Britain - the dawn of a new era? Paper presented to British Universities Industrial Relations Association Conference, Warwick.
  • 1999. Employer opposition and response to union recognition, paper presented to British Universities Industrial Relations Association Conference, Leicester.
  • 1999. Race discrimination and the law, TUC Black Workers’ Conference, London.
  • 1999. Future prospects for managerial and professional workers, Communications International/FIET European Conference, Luxembourg.
  • 1998. Developments in trade union recognition and derecognition in Britain,  paper presented to British Universities Industrial Relations Association Conference, Keele.
  • 1998. Women and employment in the UK, Freidrich Ebert Stiftung Conference, Bonn.
  • 1997. Unofficial strikes in Britain, paper presented to British Universities Industrial Relations Association Conference, Bath (with G. Gall).
  • 1997. Professional and managerial staff in the labour force, FIET world conference for P&MS staff, Geneva.
  • 1993. Derecognition revisited - developments since 1988,  presented to the 11th Annual International Labour Process Conference, Blackpool (with G. Gall).

Professional activities

 

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