GMB

General, Municipal and Boilermakers' Union

The case against fracking

Liz Truss has pledged to lift the ban on fracking. At a time when every scientific authority on earth is calling for an end to all new fossil fuel exploration, Truss is using the energy crisis to back an unpopular technology that will nudge us ever closer to the more apocalyptic climate scenarios. Hydraulic fracturing, or fracking, is a way of extracting hard-to-reach fossil fuels from impermeable shale rock. High-pressure injection of fracking fluid (water plus chemicals plus sand) fractures the bedrock and allows fossilised methane gas and oil to rise to the surface. The process poisons soil...

Good results so far in NHS

Results in the health unions’ consultations over pay have, so far, been positive. The Royal College of Midwives voted 75% yes, on a 66% turnout. In Scotland threshold targets were also met in consultations with good majorities for industrial action: RCN 90%, Unison 91%, GMB 97% and Unite 89%. A further year of pay cuts, the increased NHS crisis, and the context of strike action in other sectors is making a significant difference to voting numbers this year. Consultations for Unite and GMB (England) will be complete by the end of this month, 11 September and 27 September respectively. Formal...

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...

Local government £1,925 flat “pay rise” is a real-wage cut

Unite has already stated it rejects the local government pay offer (a flat pay rise for £1,925 for every scale point). The GMB has not made its position clear. Unison has launched a consultative ballot (closing 19 September). The Unison National Joint Council (NJC) committee has made no recommendation to members. We hear that the right wing on the committee wanted to recommend acceptance. Previously Unison had said that the union would move to straight to an industrial action ballot. On receiving the pay offer the union dropped that and went for consultation. Under the rules of the...

Uber, capitalism, Peter Mandelson and GMB

“Uber broke laws, duped police and secretly lobbied governments, leak reveals”. So the Guardian summarises its exposé of platform delivery and transport corporation Uber, based on 124,000 leaked documents. On 10 and 11 July it published 26 articles as part of its series on “The Uber files”, with more to come on 12 and 13 July. As well as illustrating vividly many things about the nature of the profit system, of capitalism­ ­— the Guardian reporting covers both the super-exploitation of Uber’s drivers and, in more depth, the corporation’s wider anti-social activities — the revelations also...

Union conferences should hear from workers, not bosses

“To introduce the debate about making work better we thought it would be really good to organise a bit of a panel,” said GMB National Officer Mick Rix at the start of the third day of the GMB union congress (13-16 June). The panel members were Paul Bedford (Deliveroo), Emma O’Dwyer (Uber), and Carl Lyon (Evri, formerly Hermes). These are not GMB activists. They are senior members of management in the three companies. The discussion was set up on the congress podium as a cosy round-table discussion. According to Rix: “The gig economy does not have to be the Wild West of workers’ rights. I do...

GMB: still a way to travel

A cut in branch commission — the proportion of members’ dues paid to branches — from 10% to 7.5% was the main item of controversy at this year’s GMB union Congress, 13-16 June. The cut had been approved by the union’s Central Executive Council (CEC) last October, with the backing of the newly elected General Secretary Gary Smith. Nearly 20 motions denounced the decision and the decision-makers. Technically, the motions had a point. Branch commission is fixed in the GMB Rulebook, and only GMB rule-change congresses can make a rule change. But with membership falling for nearly a decade and no...

Ukraine at GMB Congress 2022

Workers' Liberty members in the GMB union put together a bulletin on Ukraine for the 2022 GMB Congress (12-16 June, Harrogate). You can download it here . Ukraine was in the agenda for the Thursday morning. The Central Executive Council (CEC) had issued a statement on Ukraine , which was to be put to the congress. A Ukrainian trade unionist was also due to address the congress via Zoom. Unfortunately, the union's President and Vice-President both tested positive for Covid on Thursday morning, and the Thursday morning session (the last congress session) did not go ahead. The CEC statement went...

Get moving on council pay!

The public services union Unison has consulted with their members in local government about the NJC (joint unions) pay claim for the year from April 2022 with two options: 10% or a flat-rate £2,000 increase. The consultation went for £2,000. We agree with a flat rate claim, but £2,000 will be a real-wage cut for the vast majority of workers in local government. All pay points above NJC scale point 6 (£20,043 per year) would be worse off with £2,000 than a 10% rise. The GMB and Unite have not yet established what their claim is going to be and have not met with Unison to put a claim to the...

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