Ideally yes, that would be their function. However, imperialism has made this incredibly hard to carry out in practice since any time an independent trade union has popped up in a socialist country, the CIA has swooped in pretty quickly to try and use said trade union as a weapon to cripple or destroy the socialist system. Others have already brought this up, but Poland and Chile are the two biggest examples of places where this has happened.
If we get to a point where socialism in the dominant world system and there's no longer the threat of capitalist imperialism being able to destroy it, then I don't see a reason why independent trade unions couldn't be allowed to exist. But until we get to that point, independent trade unions are going to be used as a weapon by capitalists against socialism, just as socialists use them as a weapon against capitalism. So for now, any competent socialist government is going to suppress them, while hopefully also addressing the grievances that would cause workers to try and form independent trade unions in the first place.
Ideally yes, that would be their function. However, imperialism has made this incredibly hard to carry out in practice since any time an independent trade union has popped up in a socialist country, the CIA has swooped in pretty quickly to try and use said trade union as a weapon to cripple or destroy the socialist system. Others have already brought this up, but Poland and Chile are the two biggest examples of places where this has happened.
If we get to a point where socialism in the dominant world system and there's no longer the threat of capitalist imperialism being able to destroy it, then I don't see a reason why independent trade unions couldn't be allowed to exist. But until we get to that point, independent trade unions are going to be used as a weapon by capitalists against socialism, just as socialists use them as a weapon against capitalism. So for now, any competent socialist government is going to suppress them, while hopefully also addressing the grievances that would cause workers to try and form independent trade unions in the first place.