I’m in a Trade Union – Why should I get involved with a Black Members Self Organised group?

 

In UNISON, Black is used to indicate people with a shared history. Black with a capital 'B' is used in its broad political and inclusive sense to describe people in Britain that have suffered colonialism and enslavement in the past and continue to experience racism and diminished opportunities in today's society.

Right here and now, the challenges for both those in and out of work are extreme. With many facing the poison cocktail of both low pay and exponentially climbing bills the future looks at the very best insecure with many households simply at a loss to know what to do.

We know that Black members are likely to be in more insecure and lower paid work. We also know that they are more likely to experience poor outcomes in their engagement with public services as a result of structural racism. Just this weekend there has been another report published about the longer waits that Black communities face for cancer diagnosis. These kind of struggles can only be tackled by organising to challenge inequalities. Organising within workplaces has long been an effective strategy to identify and campaign for improvements in our lives with the support and solidarity of others.

I am inviting Black members of West Northants UNISON branch to a meeting of the Black Self Organised Group taking place on Monday 5th September at 6pm the office at 6 Darnell Way Moulton Park NN3 6RW Northampton. Hot and cold drinks and light refreshments will be available.

There will be a warm welcome whether you are or you are not active member currently.

Discussion will include:

Role holders in the Self Organised Group (Chair, Vice Chair etc)

Future meetings

Future events

2023 National Black Members Conference, 20 – 22 January 2023, The Exchange, Edinburgh International Conference Centre, 150 Morrison St, Edinburgh EH3 8EE, UK

               Motions

               Delegates/visitors

Workplace issues

If you want to have an informal discussion before the meeting, please feel free to get in touch through the branch or directly

Time to join a Union #SummerOfSolidarity

 

I was asked to present to te Independent socialists of Wellingborough meeting on the Theme of Trade Unionism today and in the future. The following is the transcript of what I presented. 

The Trade Union Movement 2022 and beyond

I’ve been a union member since 1983. First in ASTMS and after a period of time out of the Country I have been a member of UNISON since 1993. The entire time I have been a UNISON member I have been working in the voluntary and community sector. UNISON has only been organising in this sector in the last 12 years and some part of the country evidently find this more difficult than others as in my region this sector still has no lay leadership and no influence on decision making in the organisation.

The Community and voluntary sector of the union is biggest growing sector in UNISON. This is mainly as a result of neo-liberal policies put forward to shrink the state and outsource public services to third party organisations many of whom act as if their primary duty is to their shareholders. These are care services, leisure services. These are workers who have been impacted by the 2021 Supreme Court final judgement on a case of great significance for care providers and low-paid care workers. The case in question was Royal Mencap Society v Tomlinson-Blake, was first brought to an Employment Tribunal in 2016. It turned on whether care workers on ‘sleep-in shifts’ were entitled to the national minimum wage for the full duration of their shift, including time spent asleep.  ‘Sleep-in shifts’ are those where workers are required to sleep at a residence overnight with the possibility of waking to provide care. The Supreme Court found that those on sleep-in shifts in social care are not entitled to the national minimum wage while asleep over turning previous tribunal victories.

This case related to an employment that 20 years ago would be undertaken by a local government or health agency but now undertaken by a charity. Does this have an impact on tribunal/supreme court decisions?

The workers in the community sector are often in insecure employment. Perhaps on time limited contracts or hours which go up and down at the drop of a hat. Often the kind of jobs that are done are central to the welfare of the most vulnerable in our community and this ethical angle is often exploited by employers to eek out every last bit of goodwill and flexibility to ensure that the bottom line on the budget reports are as low as they can possibly be.

With better employers looking at what they can do to support their worker through the cost of living crisis, what hope for those in the community sector. 

With the actions of the #SummerOfSolidarity with industrial action from the RMT, ASLEF, the CWU and Criminal Bar Association going on strike, there has been a re-discovering of the both the mundane (who’s going to be on the picket at 6am) to the creative use of social media to engage and update the public.

There is more to come of this with local government, health and the national education union all at various stages of balloting membership for strike action.

Within this there is a dimension-shifting disconnect between all kinds of the political establishment and unions taking industrial action.

Firstly in the Labour Party, the picket of not to picket. Front benchers notable by their absence. Backbenchers link Zara Sultana embracing the #Solidarity.

Even with in the Conservative Party, there are discussions about the inconvenience of Train Drivers taking action on some days and Train Maintenance and support staff taking action on other days. Would not it be more sensible to take action on the same day they say. Conservative industrial relations guru’s the number one supporters of the general strike!

This after all is the source of compassionate conservatism who joined the public outcry when P and O Ferries made more than 1000 workers redundant with no consultation on March. These employees were sacked by a pre-recorded zoom message and initial statements about government legal action disappeared like the morning mist. Individuals were left on their own with a complex and lengthy tribunal process or the company payout which was just slightly more that they would get in tribunal. So dismayed was the government about this, that they are now considering taking action to use agency workers to break strikes.

On the more positive side is the creation of the Enough Is Enough campaign. Crucially significant is the adoption of a broader set of demands

The five demands to tackle the crisis

1. A Real Pay Rise.

2. Slash Energy Bills.

3. End Food Poverty.

4. Decent Homes for All.

5. Tax the Rich.

At a time of spiralling housing, energy and food costs. Workers need wages but they also need a homes, food and utilities

Night before last there was also an announcement by the TUC.

The announcement itself came about with quite a lot of hype and expectation, being released at 10.30pm at night. When the details came out of a petition campaign for £15 an hour by 2030.

While the call for £15 national minimum wage is to be welcomed the aspiration for this by 2030 is poor and as a movement we can and should do better than this

Returning to familiar space

 It seems that involuntary removal of my Labour Party membership is an event that takes place once every thirteen years.

I’ve looked back at the last time this has happened when I wrote this. I guess things are pretty much the same but this time I am without the good company of the late Geoff Howes.

For people wanting to know what the crack is, I am accused of being an active member of Labour Left Alliance. This is a group I never have been a paid up member to and a group others have told me have no members. The evidence is one post two years ago which ironically enough  is mildly critical of the Corbyn administration of the Labour Party. You can read the documentation here and here.

The Labour Party National Executive proscribed Labour Left Alliance in March 2022.  It did not notify any members that the organisation has been proscribed but perhaps that’s a little academic when the proscription was retrospective so no member could take action to protect their membership if they found themselves added to a social media group or chat.

I want to thank again those comrades who have got in touch with me to offer solidarity and support. I remain who and am and continue to have the same values regardless of the views of the Labour Party about me.

I also want to encourage people to act together to achieve change with or without the Labour Party by joining the enough is enough campaign.

They have five demands to tackle the crisis

1. A Real Pay Rise.

2. Slash Energy Bills.

3. End Food Poverty.

4. Decent Homes for All.

5. Tax the Rich.

Find more about it here

Unitary Democracy?

So after the announcement of cancelled elections earlier in March it now seems that there is no democratic component in the establishment of the West Northants and North Northants Unitary Council. Conservative government and Conservative Councils think it's OK for you not to have a voice.

Across the country, a third of poorer families are missing out on free food vouchers - In Northamptonshire nearly half are doing so.

Women who are at least 10 weeks pregnant or who have a child under the age of four can get vouchers worth £3.10 a week to spend on fruit, vegetables milk and other foods at participating stores. Any woman who receives benefits such as income support or jobseeker’s allowance, or who lives in a home where someone does can make a claim for the vouchers.

The vouchers were brought in UK-wide in 2006 by Labour in an effort to improve the diets of poorer families and narrow the nutritional gap between rich and poor. However, the scheme is poorly promoted and so lots of families are missing out.

There is plenty of research to show the benefits of the scheme in not only addressing food poverty but also helping develop good eating habits in young children whose families get the vouchers and improving the health of pregnant women and new mothers.

The scheme is a national one, but families in our county are missing out a lot more than other parts of the country and there are several reasons for this.

With spending on public health in the county in turmoil following the double bankruptcy of the Conservative County council and with audit questions on the use of public health funds in the Council there simply has not been the leadership in the County to address the low take up as a priority. We have a Tory council, busy raising Council tax to the maximum and balancing budgets to address structural deficits but without the time or consideration to see how the lives of the poorest families in our county can be improved at little cost to the council.

In addition to this, little is done to ensure a choice of retailers willing to accept the vouchers. There is an online process of registering as a retailer in order that they can claim back the money. In Tower Hamlets, the local council is promoting local market stalls as retailers accepting vouchers stating that the food is cheaper and fresher than in supermarkets. In this way the Council is not only promoting access to free nutritious food to low income families but is also promoting local businesses and entrepreneurs in the town. 

In some parts of the town (Kingsley front) the only retailers that accept the vouchers are ones that have closed down. With assistance from the Kingsley Park and Links View Residents Association a number of independent retailers in the area have been approached to encourage them to register to the scheme.

County Council Cutting Transport Services for Children with Learning Disabilities

I was approached by a parent of a girl with learning disabilities who had been advised that his daughter had been chosen for change in the transport service to school. The child attended the Beehive Centre and currently has a school bus pick her up from home and drop her back at home at the end of the day. The new proposal seeks to pick children up for a point that may be a mile away. Initially the proposal identified children in year 7 who had only just started school and some wheelchair user children. These actions led many parents to believe that no proper individual assessment of children's needs had taken place for the scheme.

The proposal is to implement this by 4th November at a point when pick up and drop off will be heading to darkness. This rushed timescale creates real difficulties for parents who have to work really hard to try and get some of these very vulnerable children into a change of routine.

I am arging all parents who are in this situation to make a request for reasonable adjustments. You can do so using a template email here. This will preserve rights under the Equality Act. Reasonable adjustments do not have to be considered if they have not been requested. If they have been requested, those making the decisions are obliged  to consider them and would need to evidence that process used to make the decision as to why the request has been grated or refused in the event of any challenge.

If you haven't done so already please sign this petition to try and get the council to reconsider this plan.

Children's Service's in Northamptonshire inadequate OFSTED grading

The Council’s inadequate grading of it’s children’s services by OFSTED is deeply disappointing primarily for those that use the service but also for those that work so very hard in extremely challenging working conditions in the service. Northamptonshire County Council runs one of the most expensive children’s services departments in the country and is currently heading to a £6.3 million overspend in that single department. With some sections running at extremely high levels of agency workers, (particularly the section that it responsible for initial responses to those citizens needing childrens services called the First Response Teams). These teams are running between 60 -88% agency staff, some with no permanent social workers. This together with a failure to achieve savings by recruiting social workers from overseas or to get agency workers to convert to full time social workers results in not only inadequate but very costly services. The Council is being told that the route for a stable and well skilled workforce is by acquiring something nebulously termed a “Career Pathway”. This is entirely uncosted and doesn’t seem to address the fact that the council does not pay as much or offer similar or better terms and conditions. It seems strange that the Career pathway is not juxtaposed as a strategy to returning to national pay, terms and conditions for staff as an alternative approach. This would not be something that difficult to cost, so why not?

After last months cabinet, Councillor heard from discussions with council staff and council commissioners that there were four new senior management posts being created in Childrens Services. This was not in the budget passed in the spring and it is unclear whether this is in the £6.3 million overspend. The OFSTED report is being presented to cabinet with one of the briefest papers I have ever seen also including a hazy statement under consultation and scrutiny:

“ This report will be reviewed through this structure as appropriately determined. “

There is no clarity as to the plan to improvement and no statement of the four new senior management positions on £100,000 a year and their role to taking the council to a better Children’s Service department.

Although in a previous Overview and Scrutiny meeting, the existing Director of Children’s Services has stated unequivocally that she accepts the findings of the OFSTED report, there is still a sense that this statement is not owned by the department as a whole. Three days before the OFSTED report was published at a time when senior officers would have had some idea of the impending OFSTED decision, I attended a Corporate Parenting Board meeting. At the meeting there were a number of slick presentations and some very gritty input from care leavers living in new supported accommodation in Northampton assisting them to move on to independence. However, one of the most shocking things in the report is the practise of the department in placing some of those in local authority care in “unregulated placements that are unsafe and unsuitable”. Some of my constituents have asked whether this practice has increased in the move to “Next Generation Council” ways of working. I have asked questions on this but have been unable to get an answer to date. It is also still unclear why this particular fact has not in the past few months been brought to the Corporate Parenting Board, particularly in the light of a dedicated Children’s Scrutiny Committee being abolished last year. Portfolio holder, Fiona Baker admitted that the Corporate Parenting Board should have coonsidered  this but were not provided with the opportunity to do so.

This time two years ago, the highly critical LGA peer review of Northamptoshire County Council was published. Although it was distributed to Councillors there was no content in the covering paper expressing an analysis of the report or a strategy of dealing with the findings. This was highlighted in  the spring 2018 Government Inspectors report by Max Caller report. After the report was published there was much baring of the administration’s soul about lessons being learnt. Yet here we ware again with a independent highly critical report, not given the consideration it deserves and not giving Councillors the detail to effectively contribute to the governance literally is a matter or life and death to some of our most vulnerable children.

It seems that Councillors (or maybe it is just opposition councillors) are being kept at arms length. Sad when there is so much more we could contribute.

If you want a change in the way things are done and a better Northamptonshire, for the many not the few, take a look at this and consider donating.