Scotland

A welcome move in Scotland

On Thursday 22 December the Scottish parliament voted through "gender recognition" reforms that will allow trans people to self-identify, rather than go through a laborious process of medical certification.

Scotland: yes to a referendum, no to raised borders

The UK Supreme Court announced on 23 November that it had unanimously voted no on the question of whether the Scottish Parliament could hold a referendum on Scottish independence without the agreement of the Westminster Parliament. The first issue addressed by the Court was whether it even needed to answer the question. His Majesty’s Advocate General for Scotland (who advises the Westminster Government on Scots law – not to be confused with the His Majesty’s Lord Advocate, who advises the Scottish Government on Scots law) thought not. “Why should there be a power to refer questions (to the...

ScotRail deal accepted

RMT members on ScotRail have voted by a 67.7 per cent majority to accept a new settlement on terms and conditions. The deal comprises a five per cent pay increase, plus an additional payment of £750. The minimum rate of pay has been increased to £10.50 per hour, and ScotRail has extended a no...

School strikes in Scotland 24 and 28 November

Teachers in Scotland have voted overwhelmingly in favour of industrial action to force the Scottish Government to improve the 5% pay offer already on the table from three months ago. With a 71% turnout, 96% of EIS members voted in favour of taking industrial action. The first one day strike is scheduled for 24 November. Ambulance workers in the Scottish Ambulance Service have also voted to take industrial action over pay. A one day strike has been called by the GMB for 28 November, and Unite has called a work to rule from the preceding Friday. Nurses in the RCN are planning industrial action...

Scottish health workers gain better offer

For health workers in Scotland, a bit as with Scottish local government workers in September, the mere threat of action has led to the Scottish government increasing its initial offer of 5% to £2,205 flat rate per worker, an average of perhaps 7% across the workforce. That is slightly better than the Scottish local government offer accepted by the three main local government unions (Unison, GMB and Unite). Calling off the live strike ballot which was due to close only days later was still an expensive mistake by the Scotland Unison health committee. It weakens health workers’ hand in future...

Freeze rents, expand council housing

The Scottish Government has announced a rent freeze for both private and social housing tenants, and a ban on evictions over the winter. Some of the details are still unclear, but this is a major victory for housing campaigners in Scotland. Gordon Maloney, an activist in Scotland’s Living Rent tenants’ union, has described in Huck magazine how these concessions — until the announcement resisted by the SNP government — were won, what the limitations and questions are, but also a wider perspective for transforming housing: “Living Rent has called for a comprehensive, national system of rent...

Scottish local government: strikes can win more!

Local government workers in Scotland should reject the new offer and restart the strikes. Workers in England, Wales and Northern Ireland should join them. The last two weeks’ coordinated and targeted strikes by the three local government unions in Scotland (Unison, GMB and Unite) have pushed up the offer from 2% before action was discussed, to 3.5%, then to 5%, then to a differentiated flat-rate offer (but not consolidated), and now to a new offer, consolidated. Targeted strikes of bin and recycling workers rolled out beyond Edinburgh to two thirds of the councils, and the unions planned for...

Scottish council workers force improvements

Local government workers’ strikes in Scotland have already brought some improvements in the below-inflation pay offer from the councils. Before the strikes started the councils upped the offer from 2% to 3.5%. Then, on 19 August, to 5%. On 29 August they shifted further, to (a dodgy version of) the £1,925 flat-rate offered in England. Unite has rejected the latest offer, Unison is consulting members while recommending rejection, and strikes set to start 6 September are still on. As of October, the Institute for Fiscal Studies reckons that the lowest-income 20% will be facing an 18% price...

Unison to strike in some universities

Over 90 Unison Higher Education (HE) branches recently took part in a disaggregated ballot to strike against the national pay offer of around 3%. It was a poor time to ballot over the summer, with many people being on leave, but four Scottish branches and 18 English branches got over the 50% threshold, and many more were close. Welsh branches organised an aggregated ballot but did not get over the threshold. The Scottish branches have set five strike days in September/October, in the welcome week period at the start of the new academic year. English branches will be encouraged by the union to...

Scotrail Votes No!

Scotrail RMT members have voted down the company’s offer by 866 votes to 580.

The union’s leadership recommended rejection, but seemed a bit equivocal. There wasn’t a massive amount of campaigning either way. But with a lot of bothy talk, members swung to opposing the offer.

Workers were...

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