GMB

General, Municipal and Boilermakers' Union

Speed up on 2022-23 pay!

The public services union Unison has been consulting on the local government pay claim for April 2022, with the results being fed through to Unison representatives on the National Joint Council alongside other public sector unions. Members haven’t yet been given a timeline for future decisions. The options given to members were a flat rate claim, or RPI plus 2% The claim is to be for pay from 1 April 2022, and yet hasn’t even been submitted yet. RPI inflation is currently 9.0%, so we have to build confidence in an urgent fight for a serious pay award. Many Unison members will receive the 1.75%...

Stalling in Kirklees union impasse

In mid-February, Paul Holmes, elected national president of Unison in June 2021, was re-elected as secretary of Kirklees local government branch. After the branch’s AGM in February, union officials said that the branch would be returning to normal functioning after two years under regional control while Holmes and other branch officers were suspended by the council. The council sacked Holmes on 2 February. He is appealing. Today, 28 March, we tried to contact the Kirklees branch office and got an answerphone message that the branch cannot respond to phone or email enquiries. Members wanting...

Campaign on the April 2022 pay round

The local government branches of the public services union Unison are only now being consulted on the pay claim for the year starting 1 April 2022. Following a failure in a union ballot to reach the 50% turnout threshold required by the Trade Union Act 2016, last year’s pay deal (1.75%) was settled just weeks ago. The options for a 2022 claim offered by the union leaders are 2% above the Retail Price Index (RPI) or a flat rate rise of £2,000. Our fight to challenge low and unequal pay normally points to support for a flat-rate claim, but there are problems with a flat-rate claim this year. If...

Strike for equal pay claims

Unison members in Glasgow City Council have voted to strike in their ongoing dispute over equal pay compensation payments. Some 96% of Unison members voted in favour of the strike action, beating the anti-union laws threshold with a turnout of 52.5% among just under 9,000 workers. Some days earlier GMB workers also voted for strike action, while Unite the Union will be balloting its members on industrial action on 14 March. The dispute has its roots in a £500 million settlement agreed with council staff in 2019, for which a new pay and grading system was required to account for the many...

GOSH strikers forge links

Striking security guards at Great Ormond Street Hospital held a rally on Friday 4 March, with a further rally planned on Friday 11 March, as the strike nears its full 44 days. The rally heard speeches from striking workers and supporters from a variety of unions, including RMT, whose members’ strike on London Underground had concluded the previous day. A delegation from the United Voices of the World union (UVW), including a striking GOSH worker, had visited the RMT picket line at Oxford Circus station. The rally marched from the hospital to the offices of the GOSH charity to call on the...

Gas is not green

Climate activists and some European climate ministers have slammed the EU’s long awaited “taxonomy on sustainable activities” which includes gas and nuclear in its new “green investments guidebook”. The guide is designed to channel billions of EU subsidies into projects that help the EU reach its target of zero carbon emissions by 2050. The inclusion of gas torpedos that effort. The issue is live in the British labour movement too, since the GMB union supports gas as “green”. The original taxonomy, agreed through a long process of scientific debate and negotiation in Brussels, excluded both...

Setback in local government

The ballot by the public services union Unison of its local government members for industrial action for an improvement on the real-wage-cut 1.75% offer on 2021 pay closed on 14 January in England and Wales. Unison has not published the results yet, but they are widely available. 70.2% voted for strikes, 29.8% no, on a turnout of 14.5%, far short of the 50% turnout required under the Tories’ Trade Union Act 2016. The GMB, another union with members in local government, is doing an indicative ballot. Unite is currently balloting members for industrial action, with closing dates from 17 February...

NHS pay: organise now for April 2022

In second round of consultation ballots by the biggest health unions on NHS pay, RCN members in England voted 89% for action short of strike and 54% for strike action. Unison members voted 77% in favour of industrial action. Unsurprisingly the turnouts haven’t improved significantly since the first round of consultations, 23% for the RCN and an unannounced (but similar) figure in Unison. We’re told that very few branches reached the 45% level that the Unison health service group Executive had set to trigger a formal ballot. The GMB formal ballot, which is being run on a disaggregated basis...

Unison local government: vote yes for action

Unison members in schools and local government will be receiving their ballot papers in the week starting 5 December. The union has started balloting 370,000 council and school staff for strike action over the “inadequate” pay offer. It is calling on its members to vote for strike action. Unison, GMB, and Unite have called for a 10% pay rise for council workers. Members in all three unions have voted to reject the offer. Unite are due to ballot soon, and the GMB has gone back to members for further consultation. Unison head of local government Mike Short said: “This inadequate pay offer shows...

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