Don't let them pickle local government

With tremendous chutzpah, Eric Pickles is slating Councils who dare to exercise their democratic right to increase Council tax (http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-21226239).

In so doing he makes clear the nature of the trap into which local authorities have walked by accepting Council tax freeze grant which, taken together with the requirement for a referendum even for a below inflation increase, is the most dramatic attack upon the legitimate financial autonomy of local government since, well, the last one.

(I was going to say "since ratecapping" but in truth the downward shift in the proportion of local spending funded by locally raised revenue initiated by the Poll Tax and continued under Council Tax has probably been more pernicious in the long term).

By accepting time-limited bribes to freeze Council tax, local authorities have - as UNISON warned (http://www.unison.org.uk/asppresspack/pressrelease_view.asp?id=2851) - created a future cliff edge, a long term budget gap over which central government could push them (and - when they did - the referendum lock would aim to force them to choose yet more savage cuts).

Incidentally, the idea that local authorities who put up Council Tax by 1.99% are somehow "dodging democracy" does as much damage to the English language as Pickles and his millionaire Bullingdon chums are doing to our society. A referendum gives voters a single choice, whereas an election allows us to choose between competing programmes. Local voters should be able to choose their Council - and boot them out if they don't like them.

Labour Councils in particular face an unpalatable choice between tax rises for our supporters, who are already suffering from falling incomes, or the prospect of still further devastation of local services (the "social wage" for those suffering the most).

Unfortunately the response from Labour's local government leadership is simply to cry out in pain (http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-20869246) or to retreat into fantasy (http://www.progressonline.org.uk/2013/01/16/towards-cooperative-councils/). Neither is an adequate response.

All of which makes the sensible and moderate position of "Councillors Against the Cuts" (http://councillorsagainstcuts.org/) more timely and important than ever. Pickles is playing politics with local government finance - our response should be to do (not play) better politics by developing, presenting and campaigning for an alternative to austerity.

Within UNISON we'll have to try to persuade the Standing Orders Committee for Local Government Conference that the world won't end if we're allowed to debate the merits and consequences of local authorities considering refusing to set balanced budgets...

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Unity against intolerance on Holocaust Memorial Day

The theme of this year's Holocaust Memorial Day, which is now drawing to a close, is "Communities Together: Build a Bridge". It's appropriate therefore today to read a report of emerging unity in opposition to the so-called "March for England" which annually seeks to invade Brighton in April.

Genocide is the extreme expression of the intolerance, bigotry and hatred displayed by the "March for England" - or, as the statement of commitment for Holocaust Memorial Day says "we recognise that humanity is still scarred by the belief that race, religion, disability or sexuality make some people’s lives worth less than others’. Genocide, anti-semitism, racism, xenophobia and discrimination still continue. We have a shared responsibility to fight these evils."

As well as being a UNISON activist, I am a member of the Labour Party in Brighton and am pleased to see a number of leading Labour Party members putting their name to the call for unity against the March for England.

Solidarity with Mid Yorkshire strikers

Up to 500 UNISON and UNITE health workers in Mid-Yorkshire start a 5 day strike against compulsory redundancies at midnight tonight.

This action follows three days of strike action in November which inspired solidarity and support from other UNISON branches.

For details of the dispute, which is about job losses but also about defending Agenda for Change, I recommend the online report from InFocus on the UNISON website.

Details of how to send messages of support and donations are set out on the Unite the Resistance website;

Please send messages of support to midyorksunison@aol.co.uk

Financial donations to the hardship fund can be sent to:

UNISON Mid Yorkshire Health 20671

c/c Trade Union Office

Pinderfields Hospital

Aberford Road

Wakefield

WF1 4DG

The threat to Lewisham A&E - Tories waging class war

I'm pleased to be on the way to the Lewisham hospital demonstration - an excellent summary of the necessity for which is set out on the False Economy blog (http://falseeconomy.org.uk/blog/lewisham-hospital-consultation-ignored-protest-26-january).



Of course, I'd be still more pleased not to have to demonstrate because the closure proposals had been withdrawn.



With 96% opposition from Lewisham residents to the proposed closure of the recently refurbished A&E, it's obvious that the Tories haven't won the argument for closure - and equally obvious that they don't give a damn. Closing a well run hospital in an area where no one votes Tory is a fine example of the brutal cynicism of the Millionaires' Government.



It's a further expression of the raw class hatred shown by the targetting of local government funding cuts to poorer - and predominantly Labour-voting areas (http://www.newcastle.gov.uk/news-story/poorest-areas-are-hardest-hit-cuts-heat-maps).



The question which is posed to our movement is - what shall we do?



Labour needs a final breach with the toxic politics of New Labour (the failed Private Finance Initiative is part of the background to today's demonstration) - the Party needs to defend our people now, not just sit and wait "prudently" to be elected in 2015 to govern a country which will no longer have a National Health Service.



The trade unions also need to coordinate national opposition both to the Government's attacks and to those in Labour's ranks who fail to oppose them.



UNISON's support for today's demonstration is welcome and important (http://www.unison.org.uk/news/news_view.asp?did=8317). If the Secretary of State is not swayed by popular opinion campaigners, and local trade unionists, will have to decide what to do next.

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The mystery of the movement which did not bark (yet)

Owen Jones once more makes constructive use of the platform he has as a columnist http://www.independent.co.uk/voices/comment/british-politics-is-in-urgent-need-of-a-new-force--a-ukip-of-the-left-to-counter-the-crisis-of-capitalism-8459099.html”to call for “a movement uniting all those desperate for a coherent alternative to the tragedy of austerity”

and, in so doing, throws down a challenge to all those of us who believe that we are trying to build such a movement. Owen poses the “mystery” of why there is not already an effective network of opponents of austerity.

It's the mystery of the movement which did not bark (yet).

I can’t claim to be able to solve this “mystery” completely but I think I can see some part of the answer. Let’s start with an honest assessment of where we are. The history of the first half of this Parliament is a sad history of the failure of the opponents of a weak Government with no mandate. We have failed to prevent tuition fees or to defend our National Health Service. We have failed to mobilise the potential strength of organised labour, other than for momentary demonstrations of that strength. We have even failed to win the Parliamentary opposition to anything more than the slightest leftward shift from the poisonous legacy of New Labour to the meaningless “One Nation Labour”.

What we are witnessing as trade unionists is the consequence of a generation of social and political change since the defeat of the miners. Our trade unions, objectively weaker than in the 1980s, are subjectively weaker still because of an ingrained acquiescence on the part of the union bureaucracy to the legal shackles imposed by Thatcher and Major and retained by Blair and Brown – and a self-denying ordinance from on high which prevents us from using our potential influence over “our” Party. We have, for example, hundreds of Councillors who are members of the “big three” trade unions, not all of whom merely for show, yet we have miserably failed to influence these Councillors to resist vicious cuts. Our trade unions have been bereft of a political strategy for all of the decade that I have served on UNISON’s National Executive.

At the same time very many of the committed socialists who could be mobilised to try to transform our movement are enmeshed in organisations which are plainly incapable of effective political action in the twenty first century. If forced to choose between those who consider themselves revolutionaries and those who lead our movement I would always choose those who want to change the world rather than live comfortably within it, but comrades seeking to change our world from within political parties or groups which aspire to be Bolsheviks a century ago are walled off from achieving their own objectives. Whether this self-imposed irrelevance derives from purposeless “party building” or futile electoral adventures, it serves to insulate some of our best trade union activists from the influence our class needs them to have within our ranks.

Beyond the ranks of the organised labour movement there are millions who are angry and can be mobilised (or, which is more to the point, will mobilise themselves) from time to time. Away from the timidity of our movement’s leadership and the rigidity of their critics within our movement, groups such as UK Uncut, Disabled People Against Cuts and the student movement have all shown the militancy and radicalism for which socialists hope from the workers’ movement. However, without a means of focusing organised political pressure on the Government (by posing an alternative) their exemplary resistance is inevitably reactive and therefore limited.

For all that pessimism of the intellect is called for, our optimism of the will should be sustained not only by these spontaneous struggles which are emerging around us, but also by the success with which trade unionists are resisting and limiting the damage being done to our members where we organise effectively and show courage and determination. The challenge before us is somehow to focus struggle through the labour movement in order to articulate a viable political alternative to austerity.

This is, in many ways, the task for which the Labour Representation Committee (LRC) was refounded some years ago. However, as utterly unconvincing as the mission to create a “new workers party” so obviously is, the persuasiveness of those of us who believe that we can “reclaim” the Labour Party is plainly equally in question.

The movement we have to build must be much bigger and broader than those around the LRC at present – and it may find new answers to the challenges it faces which we cannot anticipate. I cannot, however, see that there is a better place to start building the movement for which Owen rightly calls than by putting the challenge of doing so plainly before the LRC.

The LRC Members of Parliament, and those trade union leaders associated with the LRC, could become the focus for drawing together the opponents of austerity, within and without the Labour Party, within and without other political organisations and within and without the organised labour movement. As difficult as this may seem, I can’t see who else is better placed (or perhaps “less worse placed”) to do this.

We won’t build a movement overnight, but we could begin to organise some activity which tries to build upon the grassroots resistance to austerity and give it some meaningful political direction. Please let's not ever call it a "UKIP of the left" though!

Save Lewisham Hospital

Following the massive demonstration last November in defence of Lewisham Hospital a further demonstration is taking place next Saturday, 26 January.

As a one time patient at the hospital, and the father of a child born in the threatened maternity unit, I have a personal as well as a political motivation to ask readers to support the demonstration and sign the online petition.

Caught between the Scylla of Coalition cutbacks and the Charybdis of the financial legacy of the disastrous Private Finance Initiative, our health service faces potential devastation, of which the threats to Lewisham Hospital represent a crucial moment. If the Government can be prevented from closing Lewisham Hospital that could be a turning point, and the next step must be to support Saturday’s demonstration. Assemble at Lewisham Roundabout (by the station) at 12 noon on Saturday 26th January.

Barnet fighting privatisation

 

On Tuesday 22 January opponents of the “One Barnet” privatisation programme will hand in their petition, signed so far by more than 8,000 Barnet residents, to Barnet Council. The petition calls on the council to halt the One Barnet programme – the process of giving away 70-90% of our public services to big multinationals, including Capita - until they have held a REFERENDUM.

This is why they are calling for the referendum (hat tip Barnet UNISON)



We were not consulted about handing over £1 billion of our money in contracts to companies like Capita;



We will not be consulted when the services we use daily will be provided by big businesses, interested only in their profits;



We were not asked whether we are willing to give up our local democracy and accountability to councillors, when services will be subject to 'commercial confidentiality';



The ruling Conservative group did not listen when we pointed out the huge risks of letting such big contracts for so many years to a company with too many failures to its name;



The ruling Conservative group don’t appear to care that our local economy will deteriorate further when Barnet residents lose their jobs with the council and local traders lose business as a consequence;



We will have to pay through the nose if we want to get out of the 10-year One Barnet contracts and bring services back in-house

The Conservatives could pay a high political price for One Barnet, losing their majority in the 2014 council elections – but even if this happens, residents could still be landed with the One Barnet bill. Barnet UNISON have waged an exemplary campaign to resist this privatisation over many years and deserve the full support of all trade unionists.

If you can get to Hendon Town Hall on Tuesday evening you can support them in person. If you can’t then there’s an e-petition to sign on Barnet Council’s website.

Save Our Fire Service

The London Region of the Fire Brigades Union has called a lobby of the next Fire Authority meeting on Monday 21 January 2013 at 1.30pm at the London Fire Brigade headquarters at 169 Union Street, London SE1 0LL to protest at plans to close 12 fire stations, remove 18 fire engines and slash 520 firefighter posts details are online here.

UNISON's Greater London Regional Committee has encouraged UNISON members to attend if possible, and our members who work for the Fire Authority will be supporting the lobby in opposition to these cuts. Those of us who work in Lambeth have particular cause to reflect on what the FBU's Regional Secretary, Paul Embery had to say; "The helicopter crash that occurred earlier this week showed the importance of having a properly-funded, well-resourced fire service in the capital, and it is worthy of note that the first crew at the scene was mobilised from a station – Clapham – earmarked for closure and arrived within four minutes." 

We need to do all we can to oppose these cuts, which literally and very obviously threaten life and limb. If you can't get to the lobby then sign the online petition.

UNISON's London Regional Committee - to infinity and beyond?

I understand that there is a point of view that, since there are an infinite number of numbers it follows that there are an infinite number of realities.



If this is so then there must be a universe in which the London Regional Committee of UNISON, which met this morning, makes sense.



Mathematically, there must be a reality in which a Committee which doesn't care that it has failed to organise a quorate Regional Council (other than its AGM) since 2005 is nevertheless a paragon of labour movement virtue.



In this universe however, a Regional Committee the leadership of which is happy not to have a functioning Regional Council, is a sorry creature.



We need effective and vigorous unity to confront the attacks from the Coalition Government. Such unity cannot be built on the basis of dereliction of duty such as that shown by our Regional Committee, which has failed to arrange a quorate Regional Council (other than an AGM) in eight years.



Trade union democracy - which requires well attended decisionmaking meetings - is not an "optional extra". It is essential to an effective response to austerity and to the defence of workers' interests more generally.



Given the infinite possibilities of the "multiverse" there must remain hope that the Regional Committee will rise to this potential occasion and ensure a quorate Regional Council after this year's AGM.



Or perhaps not.

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Councillors against cuts

A very welcome addition to the internet is the online presence of Councillors against cuts (http://councillorsagainstcuts.org/). I urge you to follow that link (indeed if you only have a few moments online that will be a better use of your time than reading the remainder of this post).

The few pioneers who have put their names to this initiative stand in the best and proudest tradition of Labour representatives in local government, a tradition punctuated by Poplar, Clay Cross, Lambeth and Liverpool, by those who remember, with George Lansbury, that it is "better to break the law than to break the poor."

There are many more Labour Councillors whose hearts are with those elected representatives who have pledged not to collude with the Tory destruction of our welfare state. However, most of these do not believe effective resistance is possible, or fear that their reward for similar courage would be to lose the whip. In saluting those Councillors who have stood up in defence of services, I'm not with those who would denounce all those who have (as yet) failed to do so.

The task for those of us who believe that Labour should be a true shield for our communities (rather than - at best - a cushion absorbing a little of the Tory blows raining down on us) is a task of persuasion rather than denunciation.

Our adversaries within Labour are those who believe that local government is essentially a proving ground, and that all real politics is at Westminster. Whether these "comrades" (the inverted commas are for those in the Sainsbury/Progress faction) are trying to "prove" that a local Labour administration can be "prudent", or whether they are more interested in proving that they themselves would make a good MP, they prioritise the administration of the local state over representing the interests of the local working class.

Under a Government which has already - in effect - abolished the National Health Service as we have known it and taken the larger part of secondary education out of local democratic control, it is not possible to administer the local state in a manner which is consistent with the interests of the local working class. This is true with greatest force in those Northern cities (and Inner London Boroughs!) - overwhelmingly Labour controlled - where the cuts are deepest.

Developing a socialist alternative to administering Tory cuts as kindly as possible is not at all a "return to the 80s". In the first place, it was precisely in the 80s that those currently calling the shots in the Labour Party rose to power - and the actual practice of the great majority of the Party in local government was the tragic failure of Kinnock's "dented shield." Secondly, the challenge we face now is so much greater than that faced a generation ago that the comparison simply cannot be made.

"Councillors Against the Cuts" have done us all a great service - by reminding us that there is a political debate to be had about the role of the Labour Party in resisting this Government. The challenge to the leadership of the trade unions is whether we will defend these Councillors and promote their arguments, which are the logical consequence of the policies of the unions and the TUC.

It's time the trade unions fought for our policies in the Party and backed those who support them. Will we?

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Debating our future

Before Xmas I blogged some comments on a useful article by left academic Ralph Darlington about the current state of our movement (http://www.jonrogers1963.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/how-do-we-regain-our-strength.html?m=1).

I'm pleased to see that the comrades over at UNISON Anonymous have picked up on the debate (http://unisonactive.blogspot.co.uk/2013/01/building-workers-confidence-and-rank.html?m=1) - albeit the SWP flavour of comrade Darlington's conclusions isn't quite to their taste.

There is some force in their criticism that Darlington's positive assessment of independent rank and file forces is "wishful thinking". It might be more polite to say that his optimism of the will may have obscured his pessimism of the intellect on this point. Certainly, as a member from its inception of UNISON United Left, I would never claim it was anywhere near being the rank and file movement which socialists would like to see.

However, there is an obvious flaw in their conclusion that "building rank and file movements and linking with social movements is not a strategy for building and growing, they are the strategies of a powerful and well organised union not ones struggling to be relevant in the workplace." This ignores the historical evidence, to which Darlington refers, which shows that our movement grows when it is strong and autonomous at the base and reaches out beyond the workplace.

The anonymous commentator rehearses some common sense steps which any decent activist would endorse - and their reservations about cackhanded "politicisation" by activists are not entirely without merit. However, whilst Darlington may be criticised for conclusions which go beyond his evidence and argument, UNISON Active are characteristically timid and apolitical.

If we were going to rebuild our movement with the ten year old syllabus from "Winning the Organised Workplace" we wouldn't be having this debate now!

It's time to put down the metaphorical icepick comrades. UNISON Active often includes thoughtful contributions (some of which are attributed!)

I think you could do better comrades. Give it a go?

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An offer we can refuse

A week from today the national employers' side negotiators are likely to make a formal offer for the 2013/14 pay round.



Time was this annual event would have been unremarkable, but it's something which hasn't happened over the past three years. This must be a cause of some relief to the employers' side negotiators, since if we never got pay offers the employers might not need negotiators.



So, let me say it again.



A week from today the national employers' side negotiators are likely to make a formal offer for the 2013/14 pay round.



Whether there shall be any cause for celebration on the trade union side is, however, questionable.



Wiser and better informed sources than your humble blogger (Sid and Doris Service Group) predict an offer of 1% probably minus the worst of the mooted "strings" (an assault on sick pay).



I don't think we'll be putting champagne on ice in our branch office though - even if an attack on conditions which hasn't happened doesn't happen.



There would be nothing to celebrate if we end up with a pay "rise" which is a further reduction in real earnings (as the percentage increase in pay would fall well below the current rate of price increases).



The standard of living of the many local government workers who have seen neither a promotion nor incremental progression since 2009 has fallen by one sixth. At the same time, as tens of thousands of jobs have been lost, workloads have been rising inexorably.



Now is the time to implement the policy moved at last September's TUC by UNISON's own Dave Prentis - and to seek to coordinate action to smash the Government's pay policy.



This means that the trade unions in local government need to find the confidence to recommend rejection of a below-inflation pay offer, and to campaign energetically and persuasively for our members to be prepared to take strike action to win the increase we deserve.

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2013 - the need for political trade unionism

It may not be the best or easiest year in which to be a socialist and trade unionist - but there's little doubt that most years in the past two centuries have commenced less auspiciously and that those who came before us didn't flinch from getting on with the difficult job of building our movement and defending the interests of working people (nor did they sneer for that matter!)

So we have to get on with it. And we have to recognise the difficulties which we face.

The Coalition Government has cut through us like a scythe over the past two years, having come to office to find a labour movement demoralised and disoriented by the defeats and betrayals of the New Labour years. Resistance has been patchy in the sense that arable farming in the Sahara is patchy - it has been very very limited at a local level.

Those of us who hoped to engender a meaningful national fight (which might better have inspired local resistance) have failed because the approach of the national leadership of our movement has been to mirror what they perceive at the base with what might best be described as "qualified despair" - and we have failed to change this (yet).

The public service pensions dispute was our best chance to inflict a setback upon the Government in this Parliament. We failed to do so because of a lack of confidence from top to bottom of the movement. It's easy to be angry with the leadership and their supporters (and I am) but trite to characterise this simply as "betrayal."

The leadership may have been culpable for circumstances in which we did not mobilise our members for action which could win a real victory - but the importance of their lack of confidence was magnified by the weakness of the left and rank and file.

Comparing our circumstances now with those two and a half years into Thatcher's first term (which seems sensible) we have half the trade union members we had then, we have - comparatively - a pitiably weak and marginalised left wing in the Labour Party, a Communist Party which is barely an echo of its former self and a far left which is floundering and without direction (to put it kindly).

In local government, these political weaknesses are reflected in the fact that we have almost no political support for a position of outright opposition to all spending cuts. In 2013 there are fewer Councillors prepared to resist all cuts in England than there were local authorities prepared to take that position in the mid-80s.

The pointless diversion of "building a new workers party" is less relevant now than at any point in the thirteen years of (New) Labour Government, but the important weaknesses and errors are at the top, not on the margins of the movement.

We need a clear focus from the trade unions on building and developing the Labour Party as a focus for our opposition to austerity. We might wish for a different or better political vehicle for our hopes - but we might wish for almost anything. We won't get it. What we have is the Labour Party.

The failed approach of having "influence" over the Labour Party leadership is not, however, the answer, although it may well be what the big trade unions continue to try to do. This was the approach which saw Foundation Hospitals delivered with the votes (against UNISON policy) of UNISON MPs. This was the approach which has done so much to discredit our relationship with the Labour Party in the eyes of the rank and file.

We need rather to see the Labour Party for what it is and has always been - an arena for struggle to promote workers' interests.

Whether or not we believe in class war it is being waged against us. We therefore need to fight back on every front, including within the Labour Party. In 2013, more than ever, we need political trade unionism.

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New Year's Resolution - Defend Sick Pay

I started the New Year off sick and am just now getting into work, my cough providing a percussion accompaniment to the ever more expensive train.

Whilst unpleasant, this is strangely appropriate, since we know that, in their quest to offer "red meat" to some of the least evolved of their constituents, the national employers' side negotiators in local government have our sick pay scheme in their sights.

There was, before the holiday, a modest amount of confusion in the Great White Elephant of the Euston Road as to whether the employers had in fact made an offer of a 1% pay rise "with strings" to local government workers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland. It is clear now that no offer has yet been made.

It is equally clear that, when it comes, the offer to end the pay freeze will be of an increase well below the current rate of price inflation (continuing, if we were to accept, the decline in our living standards). Furthermore, this paltry offer will be linked to unacceptable attacks on conditions of service (the "strings").

One of these which has been widely trailed is a "reform" of our sick pay scheme, which provides for a reasonable and civilised amount of pay for those who are unwell. It's not difficult to anticipate the arguments that will be advanced to attack the sick, because they will echo the arguments used to justify the assault upon our pensions.

We will be told that we are featherbedded public servants and that workers in unorganised areas of the private sector cope with being impoverished if they become unwell (or drag themselves in and share their infection with colleagues and customers).

No doubt we will also be told that many Tory donors in the insurance industry stand ready to sell us products which might make up for any sick pay we could lose...

Whilst I think it's obvious that reasonable sick pay provisions (which really reflect distributional justice within the workforce rather than generosity from the employers) are essential to decency in the workplace, I can also already hear the handwringers claiming that our members don't want to fight.

I therefore suggest two resolutions for the New Year. First, we need to take the argument for the defence of sick pay to our own members, win it and mobilise for action.

Secondly, if you do go into work with a cough then be careful not to infect anyone else - unless they are arguing against action to defend sick pay (in which case they deserve it...)

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New Year's Message to shop stewards

We are now half way through a Parliament in which the Coalition Government has used the opportunity of an economic crisis caused by the banks to launch an attack upon our welfare state which they have wanted for a generation.

 

The years of pay freeze, job losses and attacks on benefits and services have not reduced the public sector deficit - because that has never been the Government's intention. For the Cabinet of millionaires, the attack on our living standards and public services is an end in itself.

 

It will be a difficult year in 2013 (as UNISON warns on our national website today - http://www.unison.org.uk/asppresspack/pressrelease_view.asp?id=2923) but if we work hard together we can make it less difficult - and make a real positive difference.

 

At a local level, since the General Election, we have lost hundreds of jobs in the Council, including some compulsory redundancies. However, we have also delayed and/or avoided many job losses.

 

The stronger and more effectively we are organised at a local level, the better will be the job that we can do to limit the damage being done to jobs and services as a result of the Government's economic policy.

 

In particular, we need to be prepared to win arguments with our members, perhaps section-by-section, to be prepared to take industrial action as part of our campaigning activity against cuts. In general we need to encourage more activism, including lobbies of Council meetings and participation in all sorts of campaigning.

 

Now more than ever we need to remember, and remind our members, that the Union is not something else, separate from the membership, and that we need to organise and mobilise our members to be active in defending our interests as local government workers.

 

Of course we also need to see a change in approach nationally from the leaders of the trade unions and the Labour Party if we are to be able to reverse the attacks upon our living standards and public services from the Government. We can only do so much at a local level.

 

Former Council Leader, Ted Knight, has recently explained what Labour Councils should be doing, with which I agree wholeheartedly and which I would urge you to read (http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/dec/30/coalition-resistance-local-council-cuts).

 

Our Branch Annual General Meeting will be an opportunity for us to consider what demands we should be making to our UNISON Conference about how our trade unions use the power of our six million members to stand up to the Government.

 

As much as I know 2013 will be tough and will see a lot of hard work, I cannot imagine a better place in which to face this challenge than the Lambeth branch of UNISON. I look forward to seeing you at the next Branch Committee and at the Annual General Meeting.

How do we regain our strength?

The previous post on this blog finished asking whether our trade union movement is as weak as it might appear, and what we can do about this.

The effectiveness of the trade union movement, at every level, depends upon our objective strength vis-à-vis our opponents and upon our subjective willingness to use that strength. A useful recent overview of our strength is provided by Ralph Darlington in The state of workplace union reps' organization in Britain today, Capital & Class, No. 34, pp. 126-135 (the link is to a freely available online version).

This focuses on the key element of workplace representation, our shop steward structure and picks out factors such as the increase in the ratio of union members to stewards (from 1:25 in 1984 to 1:37) as an indicator of decline. A reduced number of shop stewards are also less autonomous than was previously the case. Darlington argues that shop stewards are now “much more dependent on full-time union officials compared with the relative independence of the 1970s.”

However, Darlington also acknowledges evidence of the continuing strength and health of workplace trade union organisation, point out that; “even though the balance of power remains significantly in favour of the employers, they still feel considerable constraints on the ‘right to manage’ in many workplaces. Shop stewards and other lay union reps are still able to resist, amend or undermine management initiatives on some occasions and win concessions and gains on others.”

This rings true, as does the subsequent conclusion that “the two crucial basic, albeit often ignored, ingredients for the rebuilding of a strong workplace union reps’ movement are struggle and politics.”

The evidence of trade union membership data, whether at the level of the movement as a whole or at the level of individual trade unions, is that struggle is associated with growth. Periods of transformative growth in trade union power have also, historically, been associated with widespread political engagement, or as Darlington puts it; “the strength and militancy of the First World War shop stewards movement, the rebuilding of stewards’ organisation in the 1930s, and the powerful stewards’ movement of the 1960s and 1970s, did not develop in a political vacuum.”

Regular readers of this blog (Sidand Doris Trotwatcher) won’t be surprise by my conclusion that, if we want to rebuild our trade unions, we need to be prepared to adopt an assertive and combative approach, and to be hospitable to radical politics. As to the practical application of this conclusion, I shall blog further…

Plebgate - it's our fault comrades...

“Plebgate” poses a real problem for socialists of a certain age. It’s hard not laugh out loud. Unfortunately the underlying truth is less amusing.

Of course, when a former Tory Police Minister takes to the liberal press to take pot shots at the Police FederationI can think of nothing so much as the saying beloved of an old friend and comrade; “when thieves fall out, honest people smile.”

The shock with which Tories appear to be discovering that sometimes police officers fabricate evidenceis even funnier, to a cynical old 1980s lefty, than the shock with which the previously willing tools of Tory policy are experiencing their betrayal.

However, if trade unionists are the honest people in all of this, then I’m afraid we have few reasons to smile, because the reason this falling out is even possible is our own weakness.

The belated recognition being given officially to the blatantly partisan policing of the Miners’ strike of 1984/5 (reflected in Early Day Motion 775) is a reminder of how closely intertwined were the police with the last Conservative Government.

Thatcher protected the Police from her attacks upon public services because she needed a force prepared to restrain the resistance of a trade union movement thirteen million strong, twice as large as we are today.

Today our membership density is 26% across the economy, compared with a peak of 50% in 1979. The Coalition have concluded that we are not a threat and, as they have no “enemy within” they have no need to cushion the “thin blue line” from cuts to the extent that Thatcher did.

This begs the questions, are we really this weak and what can we do to strengthen ourselves?

Your P45 is 45 days nearer courtesy of the Lib Dems

As our trade unions continue to fall back in the face of a determined offensive from the Government of millionaires they continue to advance against us.

Today's announcement of a halving of the statutory minimum consultation period on mass redundancies is a case in point (http://news.bis.gov.uk/Press-Releases/Boost-for-business-as-government-sets-out-plans-to-update-employment-legislation-68512.aspx?utm_source=feedburner&utm_medium=feed&utm_campaign=Feed%3A+bis-news+(BIS+News)).

The 90 day consultation period when consulting on more than 100 proposed redundancies is set to be halved - bringing our P45s 45 days nearer in such circumstances.

The cases of workers whose fixed term contracts expire and are not renewed are also to be excluded from the consultation provisions - and we'll need to watch carefully how that is done (and whether there is scope for legal challenge in Europe).

Having spent time most days since the last General Election (as many before) engaged in redundancy consultation at the sharp end, I can say that this measure to limit redundancy consultation will serve simply as a licence for poor employers to drive down standards of good practice.

Meaningful consultation, with proper consideration of the responses to consultation, takes as long as it takes - and if trade unions are to come up with alternatives to throwing our people on the scrap heap - we need to take that time. The case law definition of meaningful consultation is not changed by this announcement of course, and union reps must certainly not become more timid in response to this deeply reactionary step.

Good employers, with collectively agreed redundancy procedures which embody current legal provisions, should stand firm and - in particular - Labour-controlled employers (in local government) should pledge to continue to observe a minimum 90 day consultation period when proposing 100+ redundancies (though of course what we really want from Labour employers is that they stop making redundancies and work with the trade unions to develop a political strategy that will deliver redundancy notices to the Ministers spearheading this further attack upon our rights!)

Incidentally, little known LibDem stooge of the Tories, Jo Swinson, who announced this assault upon workers rights, in order to appease the Institute of Directors and other swivel-eyed elements on the foaming-at-the-mouth right-wing, once founded and chaired the All Party Parliamentary Group on Wellbeing Economics.

Perhaps that's why she wants to make it quicker and easier for bosses to liberate some of us from the curse of wage slavery?

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Sectarianism - an award for the worst of 2012

On Tuesday morning I joined a lobby of Congress House called by both the National Shop Stewards Network (http://shopstewards.net/) and "Unite the Resistance" (http://uniteresist.org/).

The purpose of the lobby was to press for more rapid action in response to September's Congress decisions in favour of co-ordinated industrial action and to "consider the practicalities" of a General Strike.

On being asked to say a few words, I said a few gently critical things about the leadership of our movement (which were well received) and - reflecting views I have expressed here previously (http://www.jonrogers1963.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/resist-unity.html?m=1) - I called for unity on the left (which was less well received).

It is, of course, regrettable that the weakness and marginalisation of the anti-cuts movement, and the left generally, within our trade unions has created the environment in which there are rival, competing campaigns aiming to do essentially the same thing.

However, the damage done by sectarianism on the left is as nothing to the damage done to our labour and trade union movement by sectarianism against the left.

Also this week I had the misfortune to read a diatribe circulated electronically by a trade union branch secretary, with the assistance of the employer to all staff (not simply members of the trade union) which concerned a nationally important fight to save a vital public service.

This unfortunate correspondence, in expressing opposition on behalf of the trade union to certain tactical options proposed by activists, expressed the view that "political organizations external to [the trade union] such as the Socialist Workers' Party and/or the Socialist Party (amongst others) are behind them."

The author went on as follows; "It is an unfortunate fact of life that there do exist in other local branches a tiny minority of SWP/SP members who hide behind the facade of being stewards of [the trade union] (as well as other Trade Unions) and use their positions to continually undermine their branches and push their own brand of extreme and minority politics."

This unbalanced and ill-judged contribution to communication from the trade union movement to the wider workforce is a clear winner of this blog's award for "Sectarian nonsense of the year 2012".

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Unregulated observations

Trade unionists can have no love for our current "free" press, which specialised in attacking our movement rhetorically long before Murdoch's move to Wapping in 86 opened a continuing war on their own workers.



I'm pleased, however, to find (in today's Morning Star - http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/content/view/full/127223) that I'm not alone in suspecting that quasi-statutory regulation overseen by Law Lords may not be the right answer to any question.



It's well worth following that link to read Solomon Hughes reviewing the many misdeeds of our monopoly-owned press, and arguing that it's ownership of the media that needs to be properly regulated.

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General Secretary Election?

According to Jerry Hicks, defeated candidate for UNITE General Secretary in the last election, today's meeting of the Executive of our sister/competitor Union may be about to agree to hold a further election for that post (http://grassrootsleftunite.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/unite-make-plans-to-call-snap-election.html?m=1).



What UNITE does is a matter for the members, activists and elected representatives of that Union, including the majority of the Executive organised around the United Left (http://unitedleft.org.uk/) - an impressive electoral machine which, as a UNISON member, I can only regard with envy.



Crying "foul" because you think an incumbent candidate may use their influence to timetable an election to their benefit is fairly futile (as we in UNISON know from experience).



UNISON activists will of course recollect that we have ourselves experience of timetabling issues around such elections (including the only previously unscheduled special meeting of our National Executive Council in 2010).



Speaking with all the authority of one of the most miserable failures in the history of left wing challengers for the position of General Secretary, and as someone who has yet to vote for the winning candidate in such an election, I have wise words for those watching the UNISON Centre;



"Watch this space."



(Particularly the sixth and seventh floors).

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Can we win by force of argument?

With Osborne set to admit that collapsing the UK economy has not brought down the deficit, UNISON's announcement of ways in which billions could easily be found to restore jobs and services is timely (http://union-news.co.uk/2012/12/stop-corporate-theft-unisons-45bn-plan-to-save-economy/).

In truth, even if we couldn't identify the billions readily available, it would make sense for the Government to increase spending in order to boost the economy (and to reduce the proportion of Gross Domestic Product accounted for by debt by increasing the size of the denominator).

However, because of the stranglehold of sub-Thatcherite economic quackery on popular consciousness it is certainly valuable to have a quick answer to the question "where will the money come from?" (even if it would be a better answer to explain that that isn't the right question).

It's similar to the importance of showing local authorities where they can make real efficiencies, or legitimately draw on reserves, in order to protect jobs and services. UNISON are doing the same job nationally that many branches seek to do locally.

As opinion polls increasingly show majority opposition to further cuts it's clear that our movement is winning the argument, and the battle for public opinion, with the advocates of austerity.

However, it would be a mistake to think that there is much prospect of winning anything on this score by force of argument.

This Government are not savaging welfare, attacking the most vulnerable and undermining workers' rights because they believe these things to be economically necessary but because they believe them to be socially desirable.

The deficit (caused by bailing out the banks) is not the reason for any of this, simply a convenient excuse.

The strategic objective of our trade union movement ought to be resistance (which may help us to survive), not survival (in order to achieve which we may need to be seen to resist).

As part of this approach we need to promote the coherent and radical alternative to austerity which is reflected in the policies of UNISON and the TUC but not in the policy or practice of the Labour Opposition - and we need to fight for it in the hear and now, as well as vote for it when we can.

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Disability - think globally act locally

Today, according to the United Nations is International Day for People with Disabilities (http://www.un.org/disabilities/default.asp?id=1597).



Here in the UK every day is a day for the Tory led Coalition to attack disabled people, whether by forcing people off benefits, or out of work, or both.



The emergence of Disabled People Against the Cuts (http://www.dpac.uk.net/) is perhaps the most positive indication in this country of work being done towards achieving this year's international theme for today, which is "removing barriers to create an inclusive and accessible society for all."



The double irony, for a rank and file workplace trade union representative, of our Government's approach to disabled people is not only the hypocritical push to take jobs which aren't there (thanks to Tory economic policy), but also the way disabled workers are so often treated by employers.



Even in organisations with sound and progressive paper policies, too many managers (under increasing pressure to hit targets and cut costs) can be prone to see disabled colleagues as a problem rather than an asset.



As trade unionists we need to be clear that the problem is the discrimination against disabled people, of which such attitudes are one manifestation.



Solidarity to disabled brothers and sisters in UNISON and all trade unions, and to all those grassroots union representatives tackling disability discrimination today and every day.

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Fifteen minutes of Maude on N30?

A year ago today I spent the morning, alongside my son and many colleagues, on picket lines as part of the largest strike of my adult life (www​.unison.org.uk/acrobat/20452.pdf).

In the run up to that strike, as regular readers of this blog (Sid and Doris Picket) will remember, Francis Maude, on behalf of the Government, had suggested that - instead of striking for the day - we could organise "token" fifteen minute protest action with no loss of pay (http://m.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-15704451).

It's taken our movement a year to give Maude his wish, but today he gets what he wanted as an early Xmas present from civil servants.

The occasion for this is, appropriately enough, some characteristically Scrooge-like behaviour from the Coalition government.

In an attempt to encourage the worst employers to behave as they wish to, and to cajole better employers into following suit, the Government have launched an assault upon the terms and conditions of all civil servants (http://www.pcs.org.uk/en/news_and_events/pcs_comment/index.cfm/id/C37B0DEA-2772-4471-9EB028EF3544B85A).

This is why our brothers and sisters in PCS are organising a series of protests on today's anniversary of last year's N30 in order to focus and highlight opposition to this attack, and to mobilise their membership once more for the seemingly endless struggle to resist the Government's attacks (http://www.pcs.org.uk/en/campaigns/terms-and-conditions/index.cfm).

This limited action points the civil service union in the right direction of mobilising opposition to the dilution of conditions of service, as opposed to the foolish approach of seeking jointly to manage detrimental change, which, as I pointed out a few days ago (http://www.jonrogers1963.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/the-fallacy-of-retreat-and-perils-of.html?m=1), is very regrettably being adopted in the health service.

The package of conditions of service which have been negotiated over decades and passed on to us by those who came before represent the product of past struggle and past organisation.

We won't reverse declining union membership in the public sector (http://www.bis.gov.uk/assets/biscore/employment-matters/docs/t/12-p77-trade-union-membership-2011.pdf) with concession bargaining because if we want to inspire future leaders of future struggles we need to honour our past achievements.

Negotiators who approach an attack on conditions from employers from the perspective of looking to see what can be conceded, rather than how to mobilise members to get the best out of any particular situation, are lazy as well as timid. Rank and file organisation, with imaginative and skillful leadership, will invariably produce a better outcome than those who are experts only in knowing what cannot be done.

Today, PCS are showing a campaigning approach to the defence of conditions of service. Good luck comrades!

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The fallacy of retreat and the perils of defeatism

Regular readers of the blog not discouraged by infrequent posting (Sid and Doris Diehard-Blogger) will know that I am a happy-go-lucky hedonist rarely driven to anger.

I am, however, a tad annoyed when I see union officials (whether lay or paid) recommending or agreeing reductions in pay and conditions of service in the folorn hope of protecting jobs (or preserving bargaining arrangements).

This is particularly futile in public services, and all the evidence is that all that such "concession bargaining" achieves in these circumstances is that it invites employers to make further attacks.

At the start of the current wave of devastation of services (in the immediate aftermath of the last General Election) some of the better paid, but less economically literate, of the workforce wondered about giving up a day's pay (and work) to balance the books.

Great.

And next year? And the year after?

We face, in our Government, the specific UK manifestation of a global attempt to eliminate the last vestiges of the "postwar settlement" and to replace this with what may be considered the "postColdWar settlement" (based upon the absence of any global alternative to capitalism).

There can be no "deals" with this agenda, though we may achieve temporary truces where we are strong enough to slow it, or canny enough to divert it. Ultimately we need to reverse this offensive upon us - and that requires us to create political possibilities beyond the scope of this blog post (or - I fear - of current reality)(which, of course, we also need to change).

A recent example of the totally wrongheaded approach has been set by our national negotiators in the health service, who are (quite clearly) promoting a dilution of "Agenda for Change" national conditions of service in the hope of preserving national bargaining and fending off its disintegration (http://www.unison.org.uk/healthcare/pages_view.asp?did=14979).

This will work no better than the recent approach of a large City (but not always United?) local government branch in the North West, whose reward for conceding conditions of service to avert redundancies was (guess what?) redundancies.

As trade unionists we are negotiators and pragmatists. Compromise is an integral part of what we do. However, no one ever got the best deal they could by signalling an over eagerness for compromise at the outset. Yet this seems to be the default setting for some of our negotiators.

This approach fails. It shows weakness, it invites attack and it demoralises members.

If the employers' side national negotiators have even the hint of a thought that our members in local government might be recommended to concede conditions of service in order to enable their constituent authorities to "afford" a miserly increase in pay they had best think again.

And if there are lay elected members of UNISON bodies who think we should recommend the worsening of conditions of service that were fought for by people who came before us?

They should resign.

And those who believe that trade unions should fight to improve (rather than worsen) the lives of their members and potential members need to get involved, get active and get nominated.

Now, more than ever, is a time for (real) trade unionism.

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Local Government pay - what is "substantial"?

The pay settlement for local government workers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland (of whom I am one) is that for the largest bargaining group in the economy. If fine words about confronting the Tory pay freeze are to find meaning it has to be in relation to this claim.

This year's local government pay claim (for 2013-14) is, in part, for a "substantial flat rate increase" - but what does that mean?

Officers asked to explain, as at the recent UNISON Regional Local Government Committee in Greater London cannot answer - and that's not ducking and diving on their part, but properly observing the democratic legitimacy of the lay Committee which determined this form of words.

That doesn't mean that those of us in line to receive whatever pay award is eventually negotiated ought not to consider what we think these words mean - if we don't then how are we to judge whatever offer we are made?

I would like to suggest a test we should put to whatever offer the employers side eventually make (having thus far done no more than dangle the possibility of (a very small) carrot, which has even less substance than our claim.

A "substantial" flat rate pay award needs to be sufficient to halt the decline in living standards for a large majority of our members (bearing in mind that the real terms pay of a worker on the same pay point since 2009 has fallen by a sixth).

With Retail Price Index inflation at 3.2% (http://www.ons.gov.uk:80/ons/rel/cpi/consumer-price-indices/october-2012/index.html) that's the percentage increase required by workers to halt (not reverse or make up for) the decline in our standard of living.

Since we are asking for a flat rate increase (in a legitimate attempt to redistribute in favour of the lowest paid) we need to set (even if only in our own heads) a benchmark grade to which this 3.2% applies, so that we can judge an offer from the employers.

If we don't think now about what we think "substantial" ought to mean - in our own pay claim - we have no basis upon which reasonably to judge any offer which may be made - and that would be dangerous.

If we have this discussion only in private we shall fail to mobilise our members, rendering the discussion pointless.

If we want to ensure that workers up to SCP28 (outside London) don't suffer a further fall in living standards we need £760 a year - but that would mean all those above that point (and at lower points on the London pay spines) would continue to lose in real terms.

If we pitch this at the level at which we were happy to see members pay more for their pensions (SCP49) we need an increase of £1,332 a year.

Looking at these figures it's fairly clear that any pay offer below £1,000 a year flat rate can't reasonably be described as "substantial". This sum would sustain the living standards of workers up to SCP37 (outside Greater London), although with those above that rate still seeing a continuing fall in real income.

This is, of course, a very low benchmark by which to judge a pay offer - it wouldn't bring even those at the bottom of the pay spine back to the spending power they had in 2009.

This approach to working ought what ought to be meant by "substantial" also fails to address the question (to which I will return) of the "strings" which may be attached to any offer.

Any offer which was linked, for example, to detrimental changes in well-established sick pay arrangements (which set a modest civilised standard for other decent employers) we would be being asked to collude in redistribution away from those who are unwell.

No flat rate payment, however substantial, could justify that (and I would love to see the equality impact assessment which would justify such an assault upon those most vulnerable).

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Why health and safety at work matters

The earliest legislative victories of our trade union movement, more than a century and half ago, were around health and safety regulation. The shocking news from Bangladesh, where over 120 workers have died in a factory fire is a reminder of the conditions in manufacturing in this country before those victories.

The workers in the Indian subcontinent are not separate from our economy – they are an integral part of the supply chain leading to many of the purchases which will be made this Xmas. The same companies which employ many workers in the UK are prepared to tolerate appalling working conditions in jurisdictions where they can get away with it.

The approach of the Coalition Government is to seek to water down legislative protection for the health, safety and welfare of employees(and others). Those of us coping daily with the threat of redundancies and privatisation (however it is dressed up) may have little time with which to try to protect the health and safety gains of past generations.

However, with injuries increasing even as economic activity has declined, we need to continue to fight the battles which our predecessors fought in the nineteenth century (and to show our solidarity with our brothers and sisters elsewhere in the world who are experiencing the sort of “light touch” regulation of health and safety to which Cameron and Clegg aspire).

Resist the Unity?

I couldn't get along to today's Unite the Resistance (UtR) meeting in London (http://uniteresist.org/) but hope it's going well. I hope it will put the emerging organisation on some sort of democratic footing and provide a useful opportunity for networking.

There are some on the left who decry the somewhat ironic name of the most recent arrival amongst the national bodies seeking to co-ordinate anti-cuts activity, and others who level at UtR the allegation also made about the Right to Work (RtW) (http://righttowork.org.uk/2012/10/new-sanctions-regime-will-punish-the-poorest/campaign) (that it is essentially a front for the Socialist Workers Party).

We do, however, need to try to develop more effective national coordination of anti-cuts activity, and UtR will draw together some of those who should be part of that, including many outside the ranks of the SWP (I have put my name forward, if wanted, for the steering committee).

Others, around the Socialist Party, see the National Shop Stewards Network (NSSN) (http://www.coalitionofresistance.org.uk/) as the vehicle for the coordination of struggle. I was at the founding Conference of the NSSN and continue to believe it to have been a good idea with considerable potential.

Many of those previously involved in the NSSN have fallen away as the dominance of the Socialist Party has become more pronounced, but the NSSN retains official links with several national unions, and those who look to it are not insignificant, although their determination to prioritise their distinctive "selling point" on the left (visceral hostility to the Labour Party they left twenty years ago) can make "united front" work a challenge.

The Coalition of Resistance (CoR)(http://www.coalitionofresistance.org.uk/)has also aimed at the same target of coordination for some time, without the participation of the largest far left parties, but with high profile support and strong European links. Although on paper a likely candidate to draw people together (and is, of all these initiatives, the one for which I feel most warmth), CoR includes among its leading lights some groups whose relationship with the SWP is like a recent, raw divorce.

Away from the "Trotskyist" left, the People's Charter (http://www.thepeoplescharter.org/) (which I support) is a project (though not exclusively) of the Communist Party of Britain which has, characteristically, by far the stongest "official" labour movement backing and - equally characteristically - a low activist profile.

Looking just at the picture I have sketched out above, there are many on the left who will bemoan the "sectarianism" of the left groups which appears to be the cause of the divisions, at a national level, in an anti-cuts movement which is at its best (at a local level) when it is united.

This complaint mistakes the symptom for the cause and makes the mistake of blaming those who are present in the struggle against cuts, rather than those who bear responsibility for these problems - those who are absent.

The anti-cuts movement is not weak at a national level because it is divided. It is divided because it is weak.

The responsibility lies with the leadership of the Labour Party and, to a somewhat lesser extent, the trade unions.

The Balls/Miliband line on cuts - which could be summed up in the chant; "What Do We Want? Fewer Cuts! When Do We Want Them? Later!" Is testament to the continuing influence of vile Blairite forces around the Sainsbury-funded Progress faction. It seeks to place the Labour Party outside the anti-cuts movement and encourages Labour Councils to see anti-cuts activists as enemies as much as the Tories (a grave misjudgement which is then just as foolishly reciprocated).

In these circumstances, the responsibility to lead and unify a struggle against assaults upon working class living standards and public services unprecedented in a lifetime falls upon the trade union leadership.

The TUC have called a couple of major national demonstrations and the unions (led by UNISON) have organised one major national strike.

The trade union leadership lack confidence in our ability to defeat the Government and are therefore prone to seeing our campaigns (such as UNISON's Million Voices - http://www.unison.org.uk/million/) as being as much aimed at our members and potential members (with a view to recruitment and retention of union members) as at defeating our enemies.

If the Labour Party or - failing that - the TUC (or failing that the big unions) organised an effective anti-cuts campaign then that would be the one national anti-cuts campaign we need.

If they won't do that then we socialists need to do a number of things.

First, we need (if we can) to find an effective substitute to unite our struggles. If this can be done it may be that the General Secretaries of unions in the Trade Union Coordinating Group (TUCG) hold the key.

Secondly, we need to mobilise to hold to account - and force to the left - our union leaderships. This does require organising at a rank and file level, focusing on local activity and building workplace organisation - but those who concentrate only on these things are not doing all that is required.

We must stand candidates of the left wherever and whenever we can in our trade unions and (as much as this may divert our energies) we must campaign for their election (of course we must also build the rank and file organisation and grassroots struggle which will ground, and hold to account, whoever is elected).

Thirdly, we must press our trade unions to take our fight into the Labour Party. Our goal is not so much to ensure the selection of trade unionists as Labour candidates for public office (thought that is a worthy cause) as to fight for policies we can support and then for candidates, and democratic structures of accountability, which give hope that these policies may be delivered in practice.

We need to reclaim the Labour Party not in the sense of capturing official positions but in the sense of making the Party a campaigning organisation fighting for working people in our communities as we fight for our unions to do in our workplaces.

Of course, we must also work with socialist comrades who may not agree with every point above (and I guess the third may not appeal to every reader of this blog). I do, however, think it quite important that socialists grasp that division and sectarianism on the left is much more a consequence than a cause of our problems, and that the struggle to hold to account the leadership of our movement (whilst building and strengthening our movement) is where our energies belong.

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News from the front line in Barnet

Barnet's long war against privatisation get's some well deserved publicity in today's Grauniad (http://m.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2012/nov/11/local-government-democracy-outsourcing-barnet?cat=commentisfree&type=article).



Following the recent setback for those who see local services primarily as a cash cow for shareholders in Cornwall, Barnet is now very much in the front line of attempts to divert taxpayers' money in the cause of profit.



The Guardian's John Harris rightly credits the legendary Barnet bloggers but omits to mention the absolutely vital, central role of Barnet UNISON branch (www​.barnetunison.me.uk/) in sustaining, over several years, a lengthy struggle (sometimes against unanticipated obstruction and opposition).



Spending cuts are damaging (sometimes horrendously so) but privatisation can do permanent damage that is even harder to reverse (particularly if local authorities lose the assets and physical and managerial/organisational infrastructure which would enable them to deliver a service themselves).



We can all learn from the continuing struggle in Barnet, whether we are up against the "pure" Tory threat of privatisation to the vultures of the public services "industry" or the Tory-lite Progress inspired version peddled by those who misuse the word "cooperative" in this cause (http://www.councils.coop/).



Our trade unions require a process of rejuvenation and decentralisation if we are to engage effectively with the prospect of dozens, if not hundreds, of local authorities taking the "Barnet Road" over the next couple of years. The imagination, persistence and agility of Barnet UNISON has been and is an example to us all.

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Truth, damned truth and statistics

Over the weekend I had the opportunity occasionally to be flummoxed by maths puzzles set to a teenager.



However, enough of my brain cells have survived the rigours of decades of trade union activity that I still have a rough comprehension of statistics.



Those of us who are dealing daily with the disproportionate impact of Coalition spending cuts on disadvantaged groups certainly need such comprehension.



Let me illustrate with a maths puzzle of my own for you;



A section of the workforce of an employer consists of 70% BME (black and minority ethnic) employees and 30% white employees.



Restructuring proposals put 73% of the BME staff and 45% of the white staff at risk of redundancy.



The employer answers concerns about this disproportionate impact (which, given the numbers involved, is found to be "extremely statistically significant" using Fisher's Exact Test) as follows;



"the proportion of BME staff who may be at risk is broadly comparable with the proportion of BME staff in [that part of the organisation]".



Does this answer from the employer demonstrate;



(A) a misleading comparison between the proportion of a sub group in an overall population with the proportion of that sub group having a particular additional characteristic;



(B) a lack of comprehension of the meaning of an "extremely statistically significant" relationship between two characteristics;



(C) an inexpert attempt to downplay evidence of a potentially racially discriminatory outcome if the proposals proceed as planned, or;



(D) all of the above?



The first correct answer in the comments below will win an, as yet unannounced, prize.

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Living Wage: work in progress

The publicity received yesteday is most welcome by those who have campaigned for a living wage, however the Labour Party support does seem to come with some confusion, stating that the National Minimum Wage is the basic minimum and Living Wage is that little bit more. The Living Wage(LW) and the London Living wage (LLW) are based on a calculation of what is the minimum income needed to meet basic needs – it is the basic minimum. The National minimum wage at £6.19 remains well below the Living Wage. The Living wage and the London Living wage both increased yesterday by 25p to £7.45 and £8.55.

However with the Labour party announcement of support for living wage has suddenly seen a number of Labour councils who previously had very little interest in the Living wage suddenly declared themselves a living wage employers and some seem to have rather hastily been accredited by the Living Wage Foundation.

Accreditation is based on employers not only paying its own directly employed staff the Living wage but also contracted staff. No council as far as I am aware has fully complied with this as yet, however credit is due to the likes of Islington Council who have now signed up 80% of their contractors to LLW and brought back in house cleaners so they get more the LLW and are doing the same with waste. Islington accreditation is based on the fact that it had made good progress with it contractors and agreed be fully compliant by 2014 and the local unions were fully involved in the process.

However you do not have to go far to find a different story neighbouring borough Camden who had shown no real interest in LLW despite attempt by the UNISON to get them to do so. However they have now declared themselves a living wage employer been accredited and now flying the Living wage flag this week for living wage week. They have been accreditations on the basis of achieving this in 4 years, my fear is hasty accreditations could not only appear opportunist but will undermine work done elsewhere.

Being living wage employer is not just some badge of honour or a bandwagon to leap on, but rather about ensuring a reasonable standard of living for workers and their families.

Our employers could be accused of giving with one hand while bashing us over the head with the other. Not only has no Labour council as yet stood up and refused to implement the cuts which have led to many UNISON members being made redundant. Some councils of them have even more actively attacked terms and condition from sick pay, annual leave and refusing increments also going down the road of privatisation or increase number of part time jobs. The danger is the living wage may also be seen as the maximum wage as well as the minimum and not as should be as the absolute minimum wage paid by a responsible employer.

Turning to the Labour Leadership who have made it clear they are happy to continue to see a the pay cut to public sector workforce not only continue but deepen in real terms and Ed Milliband even argued a few months ago that an actual cut in pay would in some case be reasonable action of a public sector employer. Of cause not forgetting the Labour front benches support on the attack on our pensions which is after all just deferred pay.

I also note our General Secretary Dave Prentis felt the need to write an article on the living wage with leading progress MP Dave Miliband (maybe he forgot what he said a about progress recently) which seemed to give the agenda unsurprising of the labour party right on privatisation of public services, it ok they privatise just do it a bit more nicely!!.

Back to the Living wage, once again the campaign has been taken forward in huge leaps and bounds from it starting place in east London, but as trade unionists we must not take claims at face value we must monitor scrutinise and if necessary expose them if commitments and promises are not met, or if we find workers suffering as a result of poor terms and conditions instead. In additions campaigns like London Citizens and its sister group the Living Wage Foundation must insist on trade union involvement with any employer before engaging in discussion about becoming a living wage employer

Europe - the real story?

Half-term has kept me away from work, and therefore the local manifestations of the global crisis, for a week – but the news from Greece, as reported by Kate Belgrave, is genuinely frightening.

In the areas hit hardest by the slump, hunger is on the increase as democracy stutters, which makes next week’s European TUC Day of Action a timely move.

This is a call for “a day of action and solidarity on 14 November 2012, including strikes, demonstrations, rallies and other actions” and there will be general strikes in Spain, Portugal, Greece, Italy, Cyprus and Malta. Unfortunately I can’t find details of what is being done in the UK on the relevant page of the TUC website.

While Congress House is probably still considering the practicalities of a General Strike, the Coalition of Resistance have organised a solidarity protest outside the offices of the European Commission.

Whilst the Westminster bubble is taken up with David Cameron losing a vote, and whether the Labour opposition were right to oppose, the real story about Europe is not the squabble within the elite about the European Union, but the resistance on the streets by the people.

We could wait for a lead from the top.

Or activists locally could get on with organising events and protests on Wednesday 14 November.