Women in UNISON

When national newspapers (Gender And Unity In The Labour Movement - Guardian 17 Sept) are used to urge that its time for 'a woman' to lead UNISON perhaps its time to look at where women are in the union.

The leadership of UNISON, as national newspapers may not be aware, lies in the lay membership. At its pinnacle is the National Executive Council, of whom at any point in time two thirds will automatically be women, due to an election process that awards seats at every level on the basis of proportionality, reflecting the proportion of women in the membership. The presidency of our union is guaranteed to consist of at least two women out of a structure of a president and two vice presidents. This means that in the last eighteen years since the merged union elected its own president, only six men have ever held that office.

Union women can defeat the Con Dems

#unwc15 UNISON NEC member Jane Carolan writes in the Morning Star on the potential influence of the union's women members on the outcome of the upcoming General Election: 'The country can afford the services that UNISON members provide - services that save, protect and enrich lives - if we stop wasting money on costly privatisations and pointless reorganisations and make the banks, big corporations and the super-rich pay a fairer share in tax.

Cuts to funding are becoming critical, to the point that local authorities could be on the verge of collapse - yet if the Tories continue in power there’s more to come. Our alternative, the UNISON manifesto Securing the Future of Public Services, is available on our website.

We each have a contribution to make. Do not assume that neighbours and workmates vote. Do not assume that they are aware of the alternatives. We need a million female members speaking up for public services because they care about the services they deliver and the services that they use.

One million women demanding an alternative can make a difference. One million women demanding change equals hope'
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/a-978c-One-million-women-make-a-difference#.VN2atVZFDIU

Two in five part-time jobs pay less than the living wage

Excellent research by the TUC highlights the prevalence of low pay across the UK, north and south, with women workers bearing the brunt of poverty pay: 'In West Lancashire for example, almost three-quarters (73.9 per cent) of women working part-time earn less than the living wage. West Somerset has the next highest proportion of low-paid, part-time female workers, where more than two-thirds of women earn less than the living wage'
http://www.tuc.org.uk/economic-issues/labour-market-and-economic-reports/labour-market/equality-issues/living-wage-out

Frosty northern reception planned for Fib Dems

#betterwaydemo The TUC’s Yorkshire and the Humber region has organised a demonstration in York today where the Liberal Democrats are holding their Spring Conference. The protest against the disastrous austerity measures of the Coalition government will highlight the impact on women in particular. With an impressive range of women speakers - including poet Kate Fox and TUC assistant general secretary Kay Carberry - to mark International Women's Day the floundering Liberal Democrats will get a clear northern message that as the general election approaches they can run but they can’t hide:  http://abetterwaydemo.org/2014/02/13/speakers-confirmed/

End Violence against Women

Today is the International Day for the Elimination of Violence against Women. According to a 2013 WHO global study, 35 per cent of women worldwide have experienced either physical and/or sexual violence but some national studies show that up to 70 per cent of women have experienced physical and/or sexual violence in their lifetime from an intimate partner. Violence against women and girls is one of the most widespread violations of human rights.
http://www.unwomen.org/en/news/in-focus/end-violence-against-women

Scottish Union Women Take the Road to Dundee

#stucwomen13 This week sees Scottish trade union women take the road and the miles to Dundee for the 86th STUC Women’s Conference. The conference is being chaired by Eileen Dinning of UNISON and this year attracts 110 delegates from across the spectrum of Scottish unions.

Gender politics - from individual empowerment to collective power

More high-quality, better paid part-time jobs are required to address flexibility and the concerns of older women, according to an Institute for Public Policy Research report into gender equality. A focus on ‘women at the top’ or 'women who've made it' detracts from a strong political voice for the collective demands required to transform the majority of women’s lives: http://www.ippr.org/images/media/files/publication/2013/03/great-expectations-gender-equality_Mar2013_10562.pdf

Women are paying a double price for the crisis

#womensday Today is International Women’s Day and women worldwide will again demand for a basic, but yet fundamental right: equality between women and men. In a statement to mark IWD, the European Trade Union Confederation warns that women are paying a double price for the economic crisis. Time has come for a real change of direction:
http://www.etuc.org/IMG/pdf/ETUC_
Statement_IWD_2013_EN_final.pdf

Unions buck the trend as Women's representation in UK public life goes into reverse

Trade unions are in danger of becoming ‘irrelevant’ and ‘cannot connect to a whole swath of the workforce that thinks they died out with the ark’ former Labour Cabinet Minister and ex-CWU General Secretary Alan Johnson recently told Progress.
   Strange then, that trade unions are one of the few areas of public life in Britain where women’s representation in leadership is growing. A new report Sex and Power 2013 compiled by the Counting Women coalition, finds a ‘shocking absence of women from UK public life. The number of women in senior levels of the judiciary, education, the arts, finance, the civil service and government is plummeting’

Women are bearing the brunt of austerity

#unwc13 UNISON women activists from all parts of the UK will today conclude the 2013 UNISON national womens conference. Over the past two days a recurring theme at the conference has been the fight against austerity and its terrible consequences for women both at work and in communities. Keynote speakers yesterday included pioneering women labour movement leaders Frances O'Grady (first women TUC General Secretary) and Angela Eagle MP (the UK Parliament's first openly lesbian MP). Angela tore into the ConDems in a speech warmly received by the 700 delegates: "Women have been hit three times as hard by cuts even though they own less and earn less"
http://www.unison.org.uk/news/news_view.asp?did=8364

Not so much a glass ceiling as a concrete roof

In this article on the Dissent website the failure of some parts of the feminist movement to grasp the class politics of women's oppression in the workforce, in the economy and, yes, still in the home, is the subject of an excellent analysis from a US perspective:
http://www.dissentmagazine.org/article/trickle-down-feminism?src=longreads

Austerity and gender equality at work

UNISON activist Angela Rayner writes on the Shifting Grounds blog about the impact of austerity on gender equality and calls on Labour to follow Scandinavian countries by adopting radical policies on affordable childcare and flexible working: 'For women this can be a greater challenge as we continue to struggle for equality in the boardroom, in education and in pay. We work to live not live for work. Without vital changes to the current system we will miss out on a more productive society and lost income from the ability for all women to be active equal members of the workforce':
http://shiftinggrounds.org/2012/11/change-work-to-change-life-chances/

Women bearing brunt of Con Dem austerity - O'Grady

#TUC12 Ahead of next week’s annual Congress, Frances O’Grady, TUC General Secretary designate, sets out her stall in a wide ranging Guardian interview today. The impact of con Dem austerity on women workers is strongly highlighted: "You'd be forgiven for thinking that this was part of a back-to-the-kitchen-sink campaign. When you look at what's happening, with women being hit hardest by job losses, service cuts, threats to take away employment rights, pay depression, rising bills and lack of childcare … You could be forgiven for thinking that there is a plan here."
http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2012/sep/05/frances-ogrady-tuc-hope-future?newsfeed=true

Trade unionism a career or a cause?

The Observer ran a good feature this past weekend on the women changing the trade union movement, though disappointingly they failed to acknowledge the work of Heather Wakefield of UNISON who has presided over two major industrial disputes in local government which saw more women than ever take action in modern Britain. However the piece on women in the movement is a case of bitter sweet.

Women & Union Organising - Yes we can!

Nice to see that yesterday's Observer managed to have a feature on women in the trade union movement; not so nice to see trade unionism presented as a career option rather than a cause:
http://www.guardian.
co.uk/politics/2012/
aug/05/women-changing-union-movement-tuc?CMP=twt_gu

Women officials have the visibility.
Women as shop stewards, branch secretaries and at regional level have the real power.
Because women are taking charge in the workplace.

The O'Grady Bunch

It may have taken well over a hundred years to get here but the TUC is now to be led by a woman (Frances O'Grady). It is an historic moment for the movement but also a timely one. Women are disproportionately impacted by the savage cuts in public spending and economic decline. The progress, albeit slow, in recent decades on equal pay, is under threat from regional pay bargaining, the public sector pay freeze and regressive Tory policies on employment rights.  http://www.tuc.org.uk/the_tuc/tuc-21198-f0.cfm

Slutwalk Edinburgh

Last Saturday, around 70 people braved Edinburgh's summer weather to take a stand against the victim-blaming culture that surrounds sexual assaults. A year on from the birth of the global movement that was sparked by the ministrations of a Toronto police officer to a group of young female students - that to prevent sexual attacks, "women should avoid dressing like sluts", the issue hasn't gone away. http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/content/view/full/121173

Con Dem austerity is creating a ‘lost generation’- Prentis

As unemployment among women and young people rises inexorably, UNISON General Secretary Dave Prentis accuses the Government of ignoring the human cost of its cuts in public services - ‘it is shameful to see that women, who make up the majority of low paid public sector workers, have had an unemployment hike of 45,000, to 1.1 million, the highest figure since 1988. Youth unemployment has also risen by 54,000, creating a lost generation of young people struggling to afford education, or find work, which the government will struggle to curb. Women and young people first in the government's jobless queues!’
http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/dave-prentis/unemployment-figures-and-cuts_b_1148501.html

UNISON membership surges as whole public services workforce gears up for #N30 strike

Yesterday Dave Prentis told a packed eve-of-strike press conference that there has been an unprecedented 126% increase in recruitment to UNISON over the corresponding time last year – with 81% of those new members being women. On one day last week, more than 1,200 new members joined through the union's website: http://www.unison.org.uk/news/news_view.asp?did=7407

North East women unite to Reclaim the Night

Hundreds of women gathered in Newcastle on the 26th November to take part in the first Reclaim the Night march and candlelight vigil to take place in the city centre. Women and men marched from the Haymarket to Eldon Square to mark the United Nations International Day to End Violence Against Women.