Election 2015 - What's at stake?

CLASS, the labour movement think tank, has published the first in a series of general election guides. Election 2015: What’s at stake for work, pay and unions?
    This timely publication provides excellent ammunition for organisers and stewards to explain the unfair realities of work in Britain today and why enhanced collective bargaining is the key to reversing years of rising inequality. As TUC General Secretary Frances O'Grady says in her foreword: '2015 must be the year when we ensure the recovery, share its proceeds fairly and start to undo the damage done to our public services and welfare state by the crash and its aftermath. Strong unions, fair pay settlements and decent jobs with full employment rights are at the heart of how we achieve this'
http://classonline.org.uk/docs/election15_-_work,_pay,_unions_single.pdf

Gearing up for strike action on pay

An impressive and growing number of UNISON members are now being balloted for industrial action to beat the Coalition Government’s public sector pay freeze. Ballots of NHS members in England and Wales close on 18 September and 20 October respectively. Ballots of local government members in NJC conditioned academy schools and SJC conditioned members in Scotland close on 24 September and 29 September respectively. There is also the possibility of Police Staff holding an industrial action ballot if the recent consultative ballot delivers a majority for rejection of a 1% offer.
    However balloting is not an end in itself. As local government branches in England, Wales and Northern Ireland gear up for a second day of national strike action on 14 October momentum is building for co-ordinated action. Delivering effective action and securing improved outcomes at the negotiating table is the biggest challenge facing UNISON and other recognised unions this autumn:
http://www.unison.org.uk/news/unions-mobilise-for-an-autumn-of-protest-over-pay

Concerted union action required to reverse pay decline

This week’s figures from the Office of National Statistics confirming that real wages have fallen for the first time since 2009 will come as no surprise to public service workers. And the implications of the Bank of England’s prediction that real wages will not begin to rise until 2015 are clear.
   Wage growth requires a concerted push by trade unions. Planned local protest action next Wednesday aims to keep up momentum in the local government NJC dispute ahead of strike action on 14 October. If attempts to engage the Food Standards Agency in ACAS talks are unsuccessful, a high profile strike by UNISON meat inspectors could be imminent. Also, two important industrial action ballots are due to start in the near future.
    On 28 August ballot papers will be sent to 300,000 UNISON members in the NHS, followed on 9 September by the industrial action ballot of UNISON’s Scottish local government members in the SJC pay dispute. Effective co-ordination and prosecution of these important disputes is the only way that the decline in real wages in public services can be reversed. The solution is in our own hands.

Pay campaigning and the future of public services

The current national pay campaigns in local government and health are a necessary and overdue response to Government pay policies which have resulted in public service workers being on average £2,245 worse off in real terms.
    All of the unions involved, especially UNISON as the largest, have a heavy responsibility to halt this unprecedented downward spiral in earnings and to force employers (and politicians) to respect collective bargaining and pay determination processes.
    The stakes are high. In addition to halting the unjustified pay detriment of our members and restoring union credibility, Professor Roger Seifert, reviewing the impact of the 10 July coordinated strike action, argues that the pay campaign poses a much wider question - ‘what do our main political leaders consider to be the future of UK public services? Pay cuts, workload increases, further supply-side fragmentation, and privatisation suggest not just a down-grading of all public services but a removal of some services from public access’

All systems go for July 10 national pay strike!

#J10strike Enormous momentum is building for next Thursday's NJC pay strike in England, Northern Ireland and Wales with UNISON being joined by GMB and Unite in a united front that has often proven elusive in recent years. Many UNISON branches are reporting high levels of recruitment since last Monday's call to action. Membership confidence has been lifted by decisions this week by the FBU, PCS and NUT to strike and make 10 July a very welcome day of co ordinated action. Each of those long running disputes are broader than the NJC pay strike involving pensions and workload issues but the root cause is of course the same - austerity and the offensive launched against public sector workers launched by the Con Dem government since its first spending review in October 2010:
https://www.unison.org.uk/at-work/local-government/key-issues/local-government-pay/home/

UNISON Cymru/Wales stands up for fair pay in local government

#njcpay2014 UNISON branches across England, Northern Ireland and Wales are gearing up for next Tuesday's (4 February) day of protest in support of fair pay in local government. First out of the blocks yesterday were UNISON local government activists in Wales who lobbied a meeting of the Welsh employers in Builth Wells. The union's head of local government in Wales Dominic Macaskill said: "local government workers cannot be expected to and cannot afford to continue to subsidise local government services. Enough is enough, it is time they are paid fairly and we are calling on the WLGA to recognise this and support our pay claim."
http://www.unison.org.uk/news/articles/unison-lobbies-welsh-lga-over-local-government-poverty-pay

Local Government - time for employers to walk the walk on low pay

#njcpay2014 Local government NJC Unions unanimously agreed the 2014/15 pay claim yesterday (for submission to the employers next week) and will be seeking a minimum increase of £1 an hour on scale point 5 to achieve the living wage and the same flat rate increase on all other scale points. If cross party support for the living wage principle is to have any meaning and the joint union commitment to ending low pay in local government is to have any credibility then 2014 must be the year when an increase in excess of the 1% Con Dem pay cap is secured.

Why the 'wage share' has declined and how to reverse it

‘Since the early 1980s, living standards for most of the UK’s workforce have becoming progressively detached from growth. The gains from a growing economy became increasingly unevenly divided in favour of a small group at the top, leaving significant sections of the rest of the population (roughly the bottom 60 percent) lagging behind the average rise in prosperity, and at an accelerating rate’ writes Howard Reed. As well explaining the declining wage share Reed proposes a new social contract to...

UNISON calls on councillors to back Fair Pay as strike ballot opens

As the Scotland Local Government pay ballot opens today, UNISON has emailed councillors asking them to support Fair Pay for council workers. Scottish Secretary Mike Kirby said: “We have asked every councillor in Scotland whether they think it is fair that their employees have been offered a miserly 1%, when the value of staff pay has fallen by more than 10% in the last three years.”

It's Fair Pay Day in Scotland

Thousands of Scotland’s council workers will be calling on their local councils today to implement the living wage of £7.20 for all staff – a commitment made by both Labour and the SNP prior to the election – and to put an end to the ongoing pay freeze. http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/news/2012/mayjune/2706.htm