Trade Union Act 1871

The Trade Union Act 1871 is a United Kingdom statute that gave trade unions formal legal status for the first time, protecting their funds and property from misuse by officers or members and allowing unions to register as friendly societies. It followed the report of a Royal Commission on Trade Unions convened after a period of labor unrest, and it reversed earlier common law doctrine under which unions had been treated as unlawful conspiracies in restraint of trade, leaving their funds with no legal protection. The act was passed alongside the Criminal Law Amendment Act 1871, which controversially retained criminal penalties for picketing and other forms of union pressure, a combination that trade unionists campaigned against for years afterward. Its core protections were substantially extended by the Trade Union Act 1876 and later labor legislation, but the 1871 act is generally regarded as the foundational statute of modern British trade union law.