Bosses Tightening The Screw
I seem to say this a lot, but its because I spend a lot of my time now in the gym, and sauna as a very cheap passtime, but I was talking to one of the blokes who works there yesterday.
We were talking about sickness and the bosses attitude to it. The blokes brother had worked for the Council, and had had a heart attack (his brother is nearly 60). He'd applied for retirmeent on grounds of ill-health and been refused. In fact Council's seem to be making it impossible for anyone to retire on grounds of ill-health. A while ago one of the Council's manual employees ffrom the Council depot was told by the Works Doctor that they should return to work. The bloke had been seriously ill, for a while. Despite protesting that he couldn't return to work he was left with virtually no choice. He returned to work and four days later he was dead!
The Council has a policy for so called Management of Absenteeism. It is in fact a disciplinary policy. It basically says that if you have more than 10 days off sick during a year, or five separate periods of absence you have to be taken through the procedure. The Manager can demand that you provide a sick note from the doctor for any individual days sickness. Your sickness is monitored and you are interviewed in the terms of the procedure for any further days off. Then if you continue to have time off, you move though further stages of the procedure up to stag four where basically they can just sack you.
Five years ago when the Council was reorganised and I ended up working for a different boss I found myself coming under the policy. Although it had been months and motnhs since I'd had any time off, and for years had had not time off at all. My new boss interviewed me. Could it have been a co-incidence that in the weeks preceding I had been leading the unions opposition to the reorganisation??? Despite the fact that I only just came in the terms of the procedure by having had 11 days off sick in a 12 month period I was told I would be procesed under it, and that I had to produce a doctor's note even for a single day's absence. I raised a Grievance under the Council's grievance procedure which I eventually won at the JCC, but that took months by which time I was effectively out of the procedure anyway.
BUt this seems common that Council's in particular are using such policies both as a way of disciplining staf, and as in my case it is wide open as a way of getting at union militants. But they also seem to be using it as a means of saving money too. Apparently, my old Council since I left has simply sacked people on a number of occasions for being off sick. The bloke at the gym I was talking to told me he qualified under the rule of 85 but the Council were refusing to allow him to go - though a number of bosses have been allowed to take early retirement on grounds of redundancy recently.
My wife is another case in point. She was for many years a mainframe computer operator at the Council. The job was in fact a very heavy one believe it or not. The boxes of paper used in the line printers weigh 40lbs, and to get them into the bottom of the printer from where they are fed is impossible to do in accordance with proper manual handling procedure. Not that that would have mattered she started work there in 1987, and it wasn't until she began to complain about problems with her back that the Council actually put the workers there on a manual handling course - that was in 1999 12 years later!!! But in addition to that every month there would be a delivery of this paper, and some paper for the huge Siemens Laser printer which was even more difficult to load. Beacause the Council years ago sold off a large part of its Car park to Sainsburys next door there is no room for delivery lorries. So the delivery lorry parked down the road outside Sainsburys, and the Operators - nearly all women - had to carry a hundred boxes of this paper around 100 yards or so into the building. It was pretty impossible to use a trolly because of the kurbs on the roadside. Male managers in the IT section used to sit, and watch all this happen, whilst it was argued that it was apprently also not the job of the porters! When I started there even though I didn't even work in that Department I couldn't for shame see the operators struggle with the paper and used to go and help. Fortuntaely, at the time I had a boss whose favourite motto was "Heart is on the Left, Wallet is on the Right". In fact after numerous hospital visits it turned out that she had arthritis of the spine, a partially slipped disc, and some other damage to her spine. But when she went to see the union's solicitors to see about putting in a claim they said that the Council would argue that you couldn't prove it was due to the job. Strange that every other worker in their also had back problems then eh???
As is the nature of arthritis the problems with her back got worse. A couple of years ago she had two months off because she was in agony. The Council sent her to see the Works Doctor. Their conclusion. You should work through the pain, despite the fact that her own doctor and two separate physiotherapists said that was the last thing she should do. Secondly, look for another job because if you have any more time of sick you will be sacked!!!!! So not only no compenswation for having your health damaged, but if you have time off sick as a result you will be sacked.
Fortunately, the last couple of years she's been working on PC support after hey scrapped the mainframe. But because the Council's offices are very cramped - they've leased a lot of space out to other organisations, and of course find the room for massive offices for the bosses - trying to get at people's PC's stuck on the floor amongst a mountain of other clutter isn't the easiest thing in the world. It involves a lot of kneeling. She has now started to have trouble with her knees as a result, and because of trying to avoid strain on her back. Her doctor said a few weeks ago, "If you still want to be walking in two years time give up your job. Human knees are not built to withstand the weight of the body kneeling on them for any length of time."
As a result of having a couple of weeks off with her knees - and despite not having any time off for a year before that all of the hassle of the procedure has been invoked again, and they have now made it clear that they don't want her to work in that department any more. Of course that won't stop them being prepared to ruin someone else's knees doing the same job.
Part of the problem with Health and Safety law is that it gives employers a way out. Firstly, it says the employee is responsible for heir own Health and Safety, and secondly in a case like that of my wife above it means they can turn round and say you'll have to do another job in order to protect your health and we have a responsibility to move you. Of course what they move you to is likely to be some even lower paid, lower status job so they hope you will just leave. Nor does the Disability Discrimination Act help. You would think that if you have been made partially disabled from doing a particular job the least you could expect was that you might get some protection, that you might be able to expect that the employer has to modify your job in order to protect your health. But no, because they have the all encompassing get-out of "only if its reasonable for them to do so."
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They don't care
They'll ignore the law when it suits them and enforce it when they can benefit from it, and if all else fails they can hide behind it. I was in a disiplinary meeting today representing a man who'd had time off work. His girlfriend is pregnant and last week she collapsed. Naturally he went straight to the hospital, (he only had a couple of hours left on his shift). Anyway the next morning it triggered off the "disiplinary procedure" (three periods of absense in 6 months) and today we had the meeting.
The bosses had already left it too long to disipline him, so they use what they call "next steps". One of these "steps" was for him to find someone to look after his girlfriend if anything happened while he was at work. He told them that there was nobody. What was the outcome? I have no idea, he was reminded of what to do when you call in sick then handed the minutes to sign. WTF? By the way, representation by somebody not in the union, can they talk in these meetings? Twice I've been told to keep quiet. I'm in the process of joining the union my bosses "recognise" so at least I can do some talking in the same room.
On a slightly different note, have there been any unions targeted at a localised area (a town, city ect) as oppossed to a trade or industry?
Representation/ answer to comrade Martina
workers of the world ,unite
As a 'companion'a work colleague can represent a fellow worker at a grievance or disciplinery meeting. This meagre consession was given to workers through new employment legislation and strengthened in october 2004.
You have the right to address the meeting, ask questions , put over the workers case and sum up.You are not allowed to answer questions on behalf of the worker being accompanied.
A companion can also be an accredited TU official/shop steward. In other words a Trade Unionist can enter and represent in a non recognised workplace.
The law isnt perfect, in fact its on the side of the bosses, so join a union.
Good idea
I like the idea of a town/city union. Modern life and work patterns have changed so much that trade unions are little benefit to many people. We need something new from labour movement that will benefit millions of workers that face extreme comodification through self employment, piece work etc.
Yes
Martina/Sean. Yes there have been such organisations. The Pottery Union moved to such an organisation. It reflected the fact that many workers were employed by very small masters (not literally), but tended to live in the same locality/village. It actually however, became a reactionary form that allowed the union leaders to keep workers disorganised as the factories became larger and workers more concentrated and when factory organisation was required. For details see - "A History of the Potters Union" by Burchill and Ross.
The point as I have made elsewhere, however, is that the Trade Union is only one form of workers democracy. Factory committees can cut across union divisions, can include non-unionised workers, exclude the bureuacracy and focus on direct issues affecting workers in the factory, demands for workers control and supervision etc. But also workers committees can be formed on estates etc. out of Tenants and residents Associations, or even Neighbourhood watch Schemes etc. I proposed one group even to begin on the basis of an Environmental Watch group looking after the state of the environment of the estate. It doesn't really matter as long as you find a basis for organising ordianry woring class people into such self acting groups that challenge the idea of bourgeois demcoracy and palce firmly in workers minds the idea they can run things for themselves.
Arthur Bough
Thanks
Were the potters the only workers in the village? What you say reads like an industrial union. I'm thinking more of the benefits of two or more different business', with the workers a part of a collective union using the town as its base. One in which action cannot be taken by the employers as it is not "their" employees?
M. Daycoi
I Don't See How that Could Work
I don't see how that could work. A union can only work if it brings together workers that can put forward demands that are common to them. That means a union must be based on a factory or industry basis.
Workers of course could come together in a town or village in another type of organisation to forward their interests. I have proposed such workers committees within neighbourhoods as something Marxists shouldm give far more attention to. The Bolsheviks developed many such workers committees in workers Districts, most notably the Vyborg dsitrict, and it was from these committees that the Bolsheviks drew their strength - far more than the Soviets which the Bolsheviks were quite prepared to by-pass if necessary, and frequently did between April and October.
Such enighbourhood committees can develop and fight for workers interests in general such as control over the community, policing, housing, development etc., but they can also give support to workers at their palce of work too in the event of some dispute - you only have to think of the Miners Strike for instance of how particularly in village communities like mine everyone helps out. Even the farmer that runs a large meat supply business just along the lane from me provided local miners with free meat during the strike - of course he probably had an eye on guaranteeing their business ocne the strike was over too, but on the other hand his kids went to the village school with me, there is a certain amount of social solidairity if you're not too cynical.
Arthur Bough
Say a union controlled the
Say a union controlled the transport system, communications ect in a town, at a stroke they could cripple any and all of the town. It wouldn't take long before business would have to respond to the unions action. They would gain extra protection, from the massive solidarity from employees of other business' in the area, all putting pressure on a single employer, and it need not require those employees in the business involved to change in the way they work eg; picket lines or w.t.r. Therefore any action against them would be totally illegal. The only problems are deciding what work place comes first or business moving out of the area taking the money with them... wait a minute
M. Daycoi
Not That Easy
Its not that easy. In fact in most places a single union or confederation of unions do "control" transport in a town. But, if transport workers take action there is, unfortunately,no guarantee that other workers will support them. If bosses use their undoubted monopoly of the media to paint the striking workers up as being unreasonable, greedy, resorting to strike action rather than negotiation etc., and if other workers as they would be if the strike is effective, are inconveniened, then it is possible that rather than providing solidarity other workers can be turned against them. Look at what happened during the "Winter of Discontent" for instance.
The answer to that has been long known to socialists. It requires 1) a rank and file organisation within the Trade Union movement that links up ordinary workers across different unions and industries, so that when one group of workers takes action, its arguments and reasons for doing so have already been explained to other workers and the basis of support provided, 2) it requires a political party that at all times will stand up on the side of the workers and represent their case in the media, in parliament, in the Council Chamber in the workers communities, in the pub, or anywhere elese that workers are to be found 3)it requires that Party to be big enough and to have the resources in terms of people and say a paper or nowadays better still a website and streaming video to people's mobiles and computers to be able to get that message across effectively, an to enough people.
The rank and file movements that exist in most unions as "Broad lefts" are in fact not rank and file movements at all. They are election machines that get supposed revolutionaries elected into positions in which they then find themselves powerless, because the mass of the union they represent is politically miles apart from them. Instead of a workers party that could represent workers interests we have had the Labour Party which in many instances has tried to distance itself from industrial struggles, saying that is the job of the unions, and revolutioanries have allowed the right wing of the Labour party to get away with that because some of the largest Left organsiations such as the SWP when it was still a socialist organisation simply stood apart from the LP, and other groups have concentrated on building their own organisation rather than entrenching themselves in the Labour Party and its routine work. The organisations that do consistently represent the workers interests such as the AWL are insignificantly small, they punch above their weight, but given the tasks that the working class faces that is not enough, it is necessary to increase the effect by manipulating the long lever of the LP as a means of carrying the message into the working class at large.
In the meantime it is possible to build workers democracy by building factory committees and neighbourhood committees which can arise from a whole range of issues that unite workers. Having established htem then many other issues can be discussed such as the example you give above supporting workers on strike, occupying a factory threatened with closure etc. But again the forces of the Left are currently much, much too small to do that effectively. Again you need to multiply the strength of one by giving that one a long lever to push on. At the moment for all its faults the only available lever is the Labour party.
Arthur Bough