New campaign to tackle 'endemic homophobia' in UK workplaces

A joint study of more than 1200 workers by Manchester Business School and Plymouth University has found that lesbian, gay and bisexual (LGB) workers are twice as likely to experience bullying in the workplace as their heterosexual colleagues. It found that one in 10 of those who described themselves as LGB had been discriminated against in the past year, compared to one in 20 heterosexuals. Last month Stonewall launched a national campaign to tackle endemic levels of homophobia in Britain’s workplaces. Featuring two people at work, the campaign states clearly that: ‘One is gay. If that bothers people, our work continues’.
http://www.tribunemagazine.org/2014/02/lgb-employees-are-twice-as-likely-to-be-victims-of-bullying/
http://www.stonewall.org.uk/what_we_do/9361.asp

Austerity is rolling back equality gains

The Institute of Employment Rights has published an excellent report of a recent conference held on the theme of 'Equality and discrimination: what next for equal rights'. Legal and trade union experts dissected the Coalition Government's track record on equalities and concluded that there is a systematic (and ongoing) weakening of anti discrimination laws and statutory enforcement of equal rights:
http://www.ier.org.uk/blog/equality-experts-coalition-cuts-could-be-death-equality

NEF report identifies 6 steps for public sector pay justice - now it's over to us

Research by the New Economics Foundation (NEF) think-tank, commissioned by UNISON, is the latest in a long line of reports to identify that ‘workers on low and middle incomes are experiencing the biggest decline in their living standards since reliable records began in the mid-19th century.’      
   The NEF sets out 6 excellent recommendations (below) for government and other policy makers to adopt. However it should be added to the mix that union agency in collective bargaining, including the effective and smart use of strike tactics, will be critical to realising pay justice for workers who provide public services in the UK:

Upbeat mood at UNISON LGBT conference

#ulgbt13 Over 400 delegates and visitors gathered in Liverpool over the weekend for the annual conference of UNISON's LGBT self organised group. In a moment of collective pride, exactly 30 years after Nalgo's first lesbian and gay conference, UNISON's first out President Maureen Le Marinel addressed conference on Saturday morning. Local Labour MP and Shadow Minister for Justice Stephen Twigg praised the trade union movement's massive contribution to the recent advances in LGBT rights but noted that there remains much to do both at home and internationally:
http://www.unison.org.uk/news/lgbt-conference-twigg

Winning people to the union cause

‘I’m personally committed to unions devoting ever more resources to organising, to be willing to take risks about the new models of trade unionism we develop to reflect the real working lives of people today rather than a generation ago, I think there’s something more profound that we have to tackle. This is about rebuilding support for collective values, solidarity, people looking after each other, equality, compassion, dignity at work. These are very basic values but I don’t think we should take them for granted’ says TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady in a wide ranging interview in Red Pepper on the challenges facing the British trade union movement today:
http://www.redpepper.org.uk/persuading-the-unpersuaded-frances-ogrady-interview/

1 October 2013 – RIP employment protection against third-party harassment

Today marks the repeal of provisions in the Equality Act 2010 for employment protection against third-party harassment and xpertHR lists eight key cases from its short existence. They highlight the limitations and strengths of the now scrapped law including an EAT decision which held that ‘an employer “subjected” its employees to unlawful race discrimination when it allowed comedian Bernard Manning and guests at an event to abuse and harass them racially, in circumstances in which it had sufficient control over the discriminatory event so as to have been able to prevent or reduce the extent of it by applying good employment practice’
http://www.xperthr.co.uk/blogs/employment-tribunal-watch/2013/09/third-party-harassment-claims-against-employers-eight-key-cases/

Challenging prejudice, promoting equality

A new version of the TUC’s comprehensive guide to combating homophobia at work has been published. ‘LGBT Equality at Work’, provides legal tips for challenging harassment at work and practical advice on how unions can best represent their LGBT members.
http://www.tuc.org.uk/tucfiles/651/LGBT_Equality_At_Work_2013_Online.pdf

Carry On Regardless - Queen's Speech

Reading this year’s Queens Speech, its most remarkable trait is actually how banal it is and how little it has to offer in the real world.
  This speech has obvious gestation in recent events. After a collision with the shock troops of Little England in the local elections last week, Her Majesty's Government has clearly looked out the Dummies Guide to Reactionary policies (British edition).
   It then appears to have dictated bits at random from its collective position in the downstairs lavvy - a stance necessitated by the collective overflow of effluent.

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

What next for trade union equality representatives?

The Union Modernisation Fund has been an important source of funding of initiatives by the TUC and individual unions to promote, recruit and train trade union equality representatives in recent years. By the 2010 General Election the number had risen to 1400 - two thirds of which were in the public sector. An evaluation of the 'The role and impact of trade union equality representatives in Britain' is available online and an otherwise positive conclusion identifies the absence of a statutory right to time off (which was omitted from the Equality Act 2010) as a major barrier to the effectiveness of the role:
http://www.cassknowledge.com/sites/default/files/article-attachments/role-impact-trade-union-equality-britain-cass-knowledge.pdf

UN Committee highlights discrimination and human rights violations in Israel

The UN Committee for the Elimination of Racial Discrimination’s latest report on Israel, released in this month, calls on Israel to “abrogate all discriminatory laws and rescind all discriminatory bills so as to ensure non-Jewish communities’ equal access to work and social benefits as well as the right to political participation enshrined in the Convention”
http://www.palestinecampaign.org/un-committee-calls-for-action-against-israels-racism/

Imagine and If Only... Budget 2013: The Speech Ed Balls should be giving

“Mr Speaker, Members of the House. As you know, the economy that Labour inherited when the Tories, sorry con Dem coalition were lately booted out of the Government was one that was stagnant, indeed toxic, failing the needs of our country and our people. On every indicator, from our failing international credit rating even if it is from rather disreputable agencies, to the falling pound in every pocket, from our pitiful levels of public investment to the appalling levels of inequality in our society, we were a country that had substituted ideology for economic policy. No more. This is a government committed to enhancing the lives of the working people of this country.

The importance of trade union rights

The launch rally for the Campaign for Trade Union Freedom is being held on 23 March in London. Adrian Weir of Unite writes on the Left Futures blog about the erosion of trade union rights in Britain and the consequential rise in inequality: 'The case for free trade unions is unanswerable – but we need to make the case for a new legal framework heard! Firstly, we have the international legal rights – but they’re mainly honoured in the breach. Secondly, strong unions bargaining with employers is good economics – this is now almost mainstream thinking'
http://www.leftfutures.org/2013/03/trade-union-freedom-or-growing-inequality-your-choice/

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

Let's spread it around!

The TUC is backing a High Pay Centre report calling for 'modest wage redistribution' to improve living standards for millions of low paid workers. Frances O'Grady TUC General Secretary said 'Rising pay inequality was a major cause of the financial crash. Faced with flat wages, many people borrowed to maintain their living standards whilst the very wealthy put their cash into ever more risky investments to squeeze out returns. Unless wealth is spread more broadly we will be unable to build a sustainable recovery, as consumer spending will continue to flat-line'
http://www.tuc.org.uk/economy/tuc-21982-f0.cfm

A brilliant example of a union taking these demands beyond worthy platitudes into a hard hitting campaign can be found in Australia where the mining and energy division of Australia’s CFMEU union is calling on private companies to share the profits of the country’s mining boom with Australian workers and their communities:
http://www.letsspreaditaround.com.au/our-campaign
http://www.letsspreaditaround.com.au/campaign-materials/watch-ads

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’

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/

Far right and xenophobic UKIP members deserve no sympathy

Now just in case anyone is jumping on the bandwagon to argue the wrongs of Rotherham Council ...read the two links below and then change your sorry little minds.... give those social workers a medal not a beating:
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/2012/06/21/euroscepticism-radical-right-ford/
http://www.richardcorbett.org.uk/theres-something-about-ukip.pdf
Anna Rose

Unions call on police chiefs to arrest employment rights slide - UnionNews

UNISON, Unite and GMB are calling on newly-elected police and crime commissioners and chief constables to sign up to a new ‘Police Staff Employment Charter’. In signing up to the charter, police and crime commissioners and chief constables would agree to prevent a two-tier workforce, by ensuring the same terms and conditions for staff, regardless of where they are employed.
http://union-news.co.uk/2012/11/unions-call-on-police-chiefs-to-arrest-employment-rights-slide/?doing_wp_cron=1353660992.8601770401000976562500

LGBT members, Stronger Together in UNISON

#ulgbt12 UNISON is the only union that brings together such a large gathering of LGBT activists, Roger McKenzie, Assistant General Secretary pointed out in his address to UNISON's LGBT conference in Brighton this weekend. His impassioned speech captured the mood of conference, which has spend much of the time discussing the devastating impact of the Tory led Government's austerity and attacks on workers. Roger highlighted not only where UNISON is fighting but where we are winning such as Edinburgh, Southampton and Cornwall.