We have a moral and legal obligation to help refugees: Jane Carolan full #TUC15 speech

“We have a moral and legal obligation to help refugees”, UNISON NEC member Jane Carolan told delegates today in a moving speech backing a statement committing the General Council to campaign for Government policy to:
- recognise that the UK must play a full role in supporting refugees and fulfil its moral and legal obligations to significantly upscale its resettlement programme
- participate fully in a continent-wide response to the refugee crisis
- make welcome tens of thousands of refugees whether from camps in the Middle East or already in Europe
- .fully fund refugee resettlement, avoiding the exploitation of refugees and avoiding extra pressure on poorer inner-city communities, whilst ensuring that the international development budget is only used in line with OECD guidelines on official development assistance.

"Jane’s full speech is below.

This motion refers to events that everyone in this hall must be aware of, from the images that have been beamed into our homes on a nightly basis. I would hope that no one in this hall watches them with anything other than compassion and pity.

4 October National March & Rally - programme confirmed

#4Oct British trade unions are facing a full frontal attack. Government spending on public services and the welfare state is being rolled back decades. It has never been more important for trade unionists to protest. The TUC has published details of the upcoming demonstration at the Tory Party conference in Manchester on Sunday 4 October:
https://www.tuc.org.uk/about-tuc/no-austerity-yes-workers-rights-national-demonstration-conservative-party-conference

Click here or on the graphic for leaflets and posters to download and print.

A Tale of Two New Year Messages

A comparison of the New Year messages issued by the CBI and the TUC reveals a far more assertive and upbeat mood from the employers organisation. The CBI Director General John Cridland sets his stall out for a hard line on deficit reduction (aka cutting public spending), for business friendly restructuring of the education system, EU reform (aka deregulation, notably singling out the Working Time Directive).
   Ever hungry for new markets for his profit seeking affiliates, Cridland promotes the EU/US trade deal TTIP and calls for a radical ‘structural reform’ of public services including integration of health and social care.
   TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady focuses on the unrelenting decline in real earnings in the UK (a reduction of £487 in 2014 alone and £2,509 since 2010) and challenges employers and politicians to ‘make wage-led growth a policy priority’. While the TUC leader is right to raise the alarm about the Tory threat to the right to strike it is unclear what evidence exists (given the austerity consensus) to support her sweeping statement that the ‘Autumn Statement opened up a huge choice in British politics between radical cuts and pay freezes versus investment for the future and a strategy for decent jobs, homes and living standards’.

Extension of collective bargaining is the key to redressing inequality - Hendy

#TUC14 The damage done to workers' rights by the Coalition Government - notably the two year qualifying period for protection rom unfair dismissal and the imposition of Employment Tribunals - shows how easy individual employment rights can be removed said John Hendy QC at a packed first fringe of Congress called by the Campaign for Trade Union Freedom and the IER. Only a restoration of collective bargaining and the unfettered right to strike will give workers a real voice at work and enable unions to redress pay and wealth inequality. The Minimum Wage and Living Wage - neither negotiated by unions - provide no substitute for collective bargaining structures binding on all employers.

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

Union repression in Colombia - eye witness report

A recent British delegation to Colombia visited imprisoned trade unionist Huber Ballesteros and human rights activist David Rabelo in La Picota prison near Bogota. The TUC's Paul Nowak reports on the visit: 'Meeting Huber and David was in turns both depressing and uplifting. Depressing to see two men, committed to the nascent peace process and progressive political change in Colombia incarcerated unjustly. Uplifting to see that, despite the dreadful conditions in which they are being held, both were clearly focussed on securing justice and are determined to continue to speak out even within the confines of La Picota'
http://strongerunions.org/2014/08/04/defiance-hope-solidarity-in-colombia/

TUC deplores Gaza attacks and calls for immediate ceasefire

The TUC General Council has agreed a strong policy statement on the murderous Israeli attacks on Gaza - called for an end to the blockade, an immediate, negotiated and total ceasefire, condemned media reporting bias and supported next Saturday's national demonstration in London: 'In the third such attack over a five year period (demonstrating the futility of such attacks in delivering peace), the Israeli armed forces have so far killed over 600 people in Gaza, and the death toll continues to rise. Up to 80% of those killed are women and children – including children playing football on the beach - and many people have been killed going about their daily jobs such as health workers, teachers and journalists. Far more have been injured and over 80,000 have been displaced, and the bombardment of hospitals and other facilities further exacerbates the humanitarian crisis facing the people of Gaza. This amounts to yet more collective punishment of a population suffering the existing blockade, just as Palestinians in the West Bank suffer the occupation of their land and the continuing expansion of illegal settlements which make the prospects for peace ever more bleak.'

The full statement can be read here: http://www.tuc.org.uk/gazajuly2014

Probation services on death row

A new TUC report examines the outsourcing of offender management in England and Wales, including privatisation of prisons, probation and the supervision of offenders in the community. The report, based research undertaken by the New Economics Foundation, calls for The Transforming Rehabilitation reforms (currently decimating probation services) to be put on hold while an independently evaluated pilot is carried out. The TUC calls for a ’unified, locally accountable, public probation service should be in place to ensure one agency has overall responsibility for risk management whilst maintaining important links with local communities’. The big question is whether Labour is listening to that call as the 2015 General election draws nearer?
https://www.napo.org.uk/sites/default/files/TUC%20Criminal%20Justice%20Report.pdf

Big UNISON presence as thousands march in York for a 'Better Way'

#betterwaydemo A large contingent of UNISON members from the Northern and Yorkshire & Humberside regions turned out at yesterday’s TUC organised protest in York at the Liberal Democrat Spring Conference. TUC regional secretary Bill Adams said that 'a strong message has been sent out about trying to find a better way to do things, rather than through austerity and attacking the most vulnerable.
We've reminded Lib Dem delegates that their party is complicit in that. We are saying that there must be a better way than pushing back workers, driving down living standards and attacking the poor’

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/

TUC National Demonstration 18 October - Britain needs a pay rise (and shhh... Tories Out!)

The TUC is to organise a mass demonstration in London under the banner of Britain Needs a Pay Rise. It will take place on Saturday 18 October 2014, and will begin with a march through central London, culminating in a rally in Hyde Park. This will be the fourth march that the TUC has organised since the coalition came to power. Previous demonstrations - in support of alternatives to austerity, opposing cuts and in defence of the NHS - drew broad based support from local communities and service users as well as trade unionists. The narrower focus on pay of the 2014 demonstration (just 7 months before the 2015 General Election) will surprise many and arguably represents the first scalp of the Transparency of Lobbying etc Act which comes into force on 14 September and will make it illegal for ‘registered campaigners’ to spend more than £319,800 on seeking to ‘influence voting choice’ in the year before an election:
http://www.tuc.org.uk/about-tuc/britain-needs-pay-rise-%E2%80%93-tuc-mass-demonstration-autumn

Osborne cutting to the point of no return

‘Post 2015 we face either cutting spending on public services to the level of six and half decades ago, rolling back huge segments of the social security system or substantial tax rises’ writes Duncan Weldon of the TUC in a brilliant analysis if the implications of yesterday’s speech by George Osborne MP. The Chancellor reiterated that cuts would continue after the next election in an move calculated to lock down economic policy options into a paradigm of permanent austerity. ‘Politically this is exactly the debate the Chancellor wants’ says Weldon. The big question is whether or not Labour will continue to allow the Tories to set the terms of the debate on public finances or challenge the endless and counter productive spiral of austerity and cuts?
http://touchstoneblog.org.uk/2014/01/financial-repression-deficit-reduction

The Benefits System: EXPOSED

A TUC animation tackles some of the media and political myths about the benefits system, with the aid of a talking dog.


http://www.tuc.org.uk/the-benefits-system-exposed

UK Unions – arresting the decline

Union density in the private sector has dropped to 14% and more than half the UK workforce has never been a member of a trade union (a proportion which has doubled since 1985). A short FT video examines the profound challenges facing the trade union movement in recruiting new members and remaining relevant. Frances O’Grady, TUC General Secretary, says ‘we have to do more to invest in organising, to having mature and sensible conversations with more employers about the benefits which unionisation can bring’
http://video.ft.com/2857036809001/Unions-face-up-to-new-challenges/latest

Show Racism the Red Card teams up with TUC

Show Racism the Red Card (SRTRC) and unionlearn (the TUC’s learning and skills organisation) yesterday joined forces to combat racism through education. The agreement recognises the particular roles of each organisation in using education and training to end racism in UK society. SRTRC will mainly work in schools and colleges, while unionlearn will use its network of 30,000 learning reps in workplaces across the UK.

EU elite in hock to the interests of global finance - O’Grady

‘If the EU is about little more than protecting the single currency at all costs, privatising services and keeping a tight lid on public spending, then popular support for European integration and the European ideal will diminish as surely as night follows day. From the trade union movement’s perspective, Europe needs to rediscover the values that served it so well not just during the long post-war boom, but also through challenges posed by the Oil Crisis and the economic counter-revolution of the 1980s’ said Frances O’Grady, TUC General Secretary, in a recent speech on ‘revitalising social Europe’ to Ireland’s Institute for International and European Affairs:
http://www.tuc.org.uk/node/118945

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/

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

Zero Hours Contracts - are Labour's pledges workable?

In his TUC speech on Tuesday Ed Miliband committed a future Labour Government to end the abuse of zero hours contracts rather than an outright ban on this worst form of casualised working. Lawyer Darren Newman examines the practicalities of proposals to ban these contracts in certain circumstances only and concludes it will be the legal equivalent of nailing a jelly to the wall:
http://darrennewman.wordpress.com/2013/09/11/eds-pledge-on-zero-hours-contracts/

Hey, message to Ed - Shiny Happy Union People

#TUC13 In another boost to union Organising ....... Toronto`s York University has pointed out that the UN `World Happiness Index` has just been published and shows that the most highly unionised countries with the lowest income inequality and the best social spending programmes are top of the list. Denmark is the happiest place in the world, followed by Norway, Switzerland, the Netherlands and Sweden. The UK comes in at 22nd and the USA at 17th - below amongst others Costa Rica, Panama and Mexico. http://lawofwork.ca/?p=6881