Privatisation

PCS ballot ends 7 November (John Moloney's column)

Monday 7 November is the last day for our national ballots. Effectively though, votes will not be counted if members don’t send them off by the the previous Friday at latest. We know from information recorded by branches that in many areas we are getting close to the 50%, in some we are over, but in others, we still have a way to go. Over the coming days we have to redouble our efforts to get members to vote. We are running a disaggregated ballot in over 200 areas. This means that by the end of the ballots, we may have a patchwork of positive ballots, but others where we did not get to the...

UAL cleaners plan to escalate

Cleaners in GMB at University of Arts London (UAL) High Holborn campus struck 26-30 September, as part of a wider campaign against outsourcing across the university. At the High Holborn branch, the specific demand of the cleaning team was for an additional five members of staff, to make up for those who had been cut as the cleaning contract has been passed around different agencies in the last few years. The contractor offered an “independent investigator” to provide a staff number. But cleaners there know the reality, after one worker had to take a month off sick, whilst another had to have...

Preparing for Truss' attacks (John Moloney's column)

The first round of strikes by our outsourced worker members at the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS), planned for 5-6 September, has been suspended. Local reps felt managers for the contractor ISS were making concessions in talks that were sufficient to call the strikes off. Further strikes, planned for 13-14 September, remain on, and that action will take place if those concessions don’t turn into concrete guarantees. Our members at the Disclosure and Barring Service (DBS) centre in Liverpool, run by Hinduja Global Systems, are on strike between 5 to 10 September...

Preparing for 26 September (John Moloney's column)

Our outsourced worker members at the Department for Business, Energy, and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) will strike again on 5-6 and 13-14 September. It’s part of their long-running fight for workplace justice. They’re striking to win improved pay and terms and conditions. The outsourced contracts at BEIS are due to be re-tendered next year. The employer plans to take a number of outsourced contracts and consolidate them into a smaller number of regional contracts, with one for security and a separate one for cleaning, reception, and catering. We’re mounting a legal challenge to that, as we don’t...

Preparing for battle (John Moloney's column)

The PCS National Executive (NEC) meets on 13-14 July, and will decide on the tactical nuances for our upcoming ballot over pay and conditions, including the timetable and exact form of the ballot. There’s a clear majority on the NEC for disaggregating the ballot by department, which many feel is the best way to guarantee the maximum number of members being able to take action. Historically I’ve always favoured singular, aggregated ballots for national pay and conditions disputes, but this is a tactical question rather than a matter of principle. One message I’m hearing strongly from rank-and...

A public service railway!

Mick Lynch, general secretary of the RMT rail union, on Peston on ITV, responded to Tory MP Robert Jenrick about how to increase demand for the railways: “The worst way you could do it is by insisting the fares go up by RPI ripping off the commuters, but you won’t give the workers RPI… Last year, profits were made by the train operators — £500m out of that subsidy you gave went to those companies. First Group and Go Ahead, whom we’re negotiating with, are both subject to takeovers from private equity companies. “They’re going to be worth billions because they know you’re going to keep...

Building for September (John Moloney's column)

Several PCS branches are reporting increases in membership since the RMT announced its strikes. Having a major national strike taking place and being spoken about, in the media but also in workplaces and communities, makes the labour movement visible and reminds people what unions are fundamentally for. We want to take advantage of that atmosphere to build for our strike ballot in September. On 6 July, lay reps and officials will meet with full-time officials to agree a plan for a series of campaign meetings. Those meetings will help organise the effort to mobilise the vote in the ballot, but...

An uptick in struggle (John Moloney's column)

I visited the picket line of our members at the British Council, who struck for three days from 15-17 June, in a dispute over job cuts. The employer wants to restructure the organisation; the demands of the dispute are for transparency in the restructure process, no compulsory redundancies, and no outsourcing or privatisation of jobs. The strikers have been boosted by the support they’ve received via social media, and from several MPs. I’ve also been meeting recently with officials from the Government Property Agency, a body which is responsible for overseeing government buildings. It will...

Jobcentre workers demonstrate against fixed-term sackings

On Friday 10 June jobcentre workers in Lewisham (South London) demonstrated against the sacking of fixed-term staff taken on early in the pandemic, with the support of other local trade unionists, Labour Party activists and Labour councillors. They also received a statement of solidarity from Lewisham Deptford MP Vicky Foxcroft, which was read out at the protest at Lewisham town hall. The background is the sluggishness of their union PCS nationally in doing anything to help these mainly young workers oppose thousands of job losses across the country. One of the Lewisham reps, Tom Harris...

Stop the Tories wrecking the NHS

The HRT treatment shortages and the record waiting lists show the NHS increasingly unable to provide a basic public health system covering the entire population. Why is there so little political noise about this? The quiet is possible only because of silence and stillness from the labour movement, the trade unions and Labour. Stats in the Financial Times ( 28 April) should shatter any complacency. • Thirty years ago the share of GDP spent on “out of pocket” health costs was less than 1% here, over 2% in the US. Now it is almost level, about 2%. • Since 2010, paid-for health costs as a share of...

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