Unite and PCS unions plan talks over increased co-operation Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the PCS union, says talks with Unite will deepen their relationship. The Unite and PCS trade unions are to step up talks over co-operation in a move that will bring the UK's largest private sector union closer to the country's largest civil service union. Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the PCS, said the organisation's annual conference in May will debate a motion on "deepening" the relationship with Unite. However, Serwotka said full-blown merger talks will not take place for the foreseeable future, dampening speculation that the creation of a super-union with 1.8 million members is imminent. "We will continue close working with Unite, extend it in to other parts of the union and explore the possibility of deepening our relationship," said Serwotka. He added there is a strong case for eliminating the traditional division between public and private sector unions. There's a motion from our executive about our closer working relationship with Unite and that will give us an indication about how to take it forward. It shows that the old view that unions come either from the private or public sector needs to be challenged. Unite has around 1.5m members, including strong representation in the car, finance and transport industries, while the PCS has 280,000 members including employees at the DVLA and Border Agency. Serwotka indicated in an interview with the Guardian that a merger, if it happens, will be a long-term project. "Where it goes depends on how it is seen to have gone on the ground and that is not a matter of weeks and months, that is a matter of some years," he said. Both unions signed a co-operation agreement last year. Trade union membership in the UK has slipped from its heyday of 13 million in 1979 to around 6.5 million in 2012.