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As Britain’s best-known trade union leader, bearded Len ­McCluskey is used to brickbats as well as bouquets.

The prominent Unite leader has developed a public Zen-like calm to flick aside assassins and chuckles a lot for a Scouser who, inside, is obviously furious his enemies play the man, not the ball.

Hard as nails yet personally engaging, the firebrand dubbed “Red Len” who started out on Liverpool’s docks is a far more sophisticated operator than he is often portrayed.

To champion the car industry and UK manufacturing, McCluskey is forging an unlikely close working relationship with Business Secretary Greg Clark .

“I can only take people as I find them,” he told me on his way to meet workers and management in the big 650-job Cummins engine plant in Darlington.

(Image: PA)

“His predecessor, Sajid Javid , I found a difficult man to talk to when raising anything about manufacturing strategy. I find Greg Clark more open to discussion and eager to seek common ground.”

Unite is discussing when Clark, the son of a Middlesbrough milkman, will speak about the future of motor manufacturing at a union conference. The Minister put the brakes on a proposed appearance on the weekend just gone.

McCluskey’s immediate priority is re-election as Unite’s general secretary.

Ballot papers will this week be posted to the union’s 1.3 million members in areas as diverse as agriculture, finance, NHS , local authorities, defence, transport and factories.

He is the red-hot favourite after securing six times as many branch nominations as main challenger Gerard Coyne, the West Midlands secretary who is on the right of the union.

(Image: Getty Images Europe)

But McCluskey’s calm is briefly replaced by molten anger when asked about attacks from within on himself and the union.

McCluskey accuses his enemies – including Labour deputy leader Tom Watson, who has gone from friend to foe and he has described as the puppet master pulling Coyne’s strings – of “trashing” Unite to use the union’s ­election to undermine Jeremy Corbyn .

“It’s been shameful and I’m disappointed at the poisonous lies, smears and innuendo, aided and abetted by our right wing media,” says McCluskey.

“We represent working people. Their interests are not pursued by tarnishing Unite, treating my election as a way of having a go at the leader of the Labour Party .”

McCluskey insists Jeremy Corbyn ’s name crops up rarely when he chats with workers, who more worried about improving wages and keeping their jobs.

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He rattles off the main issues raised as he tours workplaces: “Zero hours contracts, low pay, erosion of conditions, job insecurity – all these are common issues and in the manufacturing sector a deep, deep concern about Brexit .”

Even economists favouring Brexit concede that industry will be damaged by leaving the EU’s single market and customs union, any taxes slapped on goods sold over the Channel and the threat of bureaucracy harming business.

Ford’s European president, says McCluskey, warned him the US car giant’s HQ in Detroit will not guarantee us a share of a £4billion investment in electric cars until Brexit was settled.

Nissan’s boss has expressed worries about his firm’s future here and Peugeot buying Vauxhall worries staff in Vauxhall’s Ellesmere Port and Luton plants.

McCluskey and Unite called for a Remain vote in last June’s referendum and his answer to hostility to migration in some Labour heartlands is to outlaw all exploitation, so the worst employers cannot profit from cheaper labour.

(Image: TIM ANDERSON)

“ Brexit looms and we do seek to control the labour market when there is no doubt migrant labour is being used by greedy bosses to undercut pay and conditions. By doing that they break down social cohesion in our communities,” he says.

“I’m looking for an answer. I’m looking for access to the single market, which is important to manufacturing and exporters, and if that means freedom of movement in Europe, that’s fine.

"But employers using migrant labour must have an agreement with a trade union, so we create a rate for the job.

“If we end the abuse of migrant labour, then greedy bosses can’t exploit them. Migrant workers are to blame for nothing. It’s the greedy bosses to blame.”

Retaining access to the single market, he believes, is vital and quitting the EU with no agreement would be disastrous.

(Image: Daily Mirror)

“No deal is a worse deal,” he says. “The uncertainty that would create is crazy.”

Industrially, the union has made the running against Sports Direct. But it is yet to crack organising within the company when most workers are migrants or temporary agency workers.

Unite has a £36 million strike fund, paying £35 a day, with the ability to double that.

But like the late rail workers’ leader, Bob Crow, the truth is that Red Len has settled more disputes than he has called strikes.

“In the past three years we’ve had 1,000 industrial action ballots and every one got a result with a satisfactory outcome. Not all ended in strikes but the threat was important,” he says.

(Image: PA)

“It’s about us being confident of who we are: an independent union fighting for people in work. Defending the rights of our members is what Unite is about.”

Publicly, the election is dominated by questions on the leadership of Unite-backed Mr Corbyn.

As I met McCluskey in Newcastle, he was watching a BBC report claiming he was ready to fund Labour’s Momentum faction.

“I’ve not said anything,” he said with a tired smile, clearly irritated.

“This is just Tom Watson doing his pale imitation of Don Corleone, trying to see if he can run my union by interfering in an election.

“It’s shameful and sad that Tom turns on his friends, when in his dark days when he was under attack by Murdoch and the right wing, we stood by him.”

(Image: Daily Mirror)

Mr Corbyn is not offered unconditional support and nor does he wish to destabilise the leader when he suggests the union will take stock in mid-2018 if the party is still struggling in the polls.

“Unite is the largest affiliate to the Labour Party and of course we support the leader,” he says.

“We continue to try to achieve the policies Unite members want. The current Labour leadership have had an open door policy towards the unions. That’s very different to previous Labour leaders.

“I do see the prospect of a Labour Government in 2020. It may be a minority Labour Government because I don’t see the Tories being able to form one, even though they may be the largest party.

“I hope Jeremy can rectify the unfair image the media have placed upon him. We all have to do what we can and see how the next 15 months unfolds.

“From Unite’s point of view, I believe we have done the right thing defending the democracy of the Labour Party and given a decent man, and a kind man, an opportunity to promote an alternative to the devastating austerity that the Tories are placing on the backs of ordinary working people in our communities.”