“Workers Uniting” - a top down decision devoid of democracy

There are a number of serious problems with the ‘merger’ between the United Steel Workers of America and UNITE. To say that the process was somewhat lacking would be an understatement. The members have had no say on the decision, and to my knowledge there has not been any serious discussion on the union Executive Committee.

You might have imagined that the leadership would recognise that this was a big and unprecedented step for the union, which required a discussion amongst the membership, to convince them that it was a good idea. But the decision has been taken at the top with absolutely no involvement of the membership. This is a bad precedent for the democracy of the union, treating the members as foot soldiers rather than seeking to enshrine membership involvement and control.

Prescription charges - time to abolish them

The Citizens Advice Bureau, together with organisations such as the Macmillan cancer charity are calling for the scrapping of prescription charges. They report that patients who need long term medication are endangering their health by not taking the drugs they need because they cannot afford to pay the prescription charges. They estimate that as many as 800,000 have not been getting the drugs prescribed for them. This group includes people with cancer, asthma and HIV, which are not on the list of exemptions from charges. The list apparently dates from 1968.

Tory wins seat on Council estate - “We did very well”, says Labour leader

The Labour Party in Swindon maintained its ’strength’ on the Council, losing one seat and gaining another. Yet that leaves them with 12 seats compared to the Tories 42. The scale of the decline of Labour locally is given perspective when you consider that even at the height of the Thatcher government Labour maintained control of Swindon, or Thamesdown as it was then.

Unite - insulting the intelligence of the members

You might call it a Hamlet moment, though in this case it’s not so much “to be or not to be”, as whether to laugh or cry, or blow a gasket. I have just received a survey for Unite members, of which I am one. Apparently my view counts. I hope so. However, the letter signed by Derek Simpson and Tony Woodley can only be described as other-worldly.

Supporting “non-existent colleagues”

The furore over the strike by workers at Grangemouth refinery is predictable. Government Ministers have lined up to say that the dispute is unecessary. Yet all the workers are doing is defending their final salary pension. What is especially important about the dispute is the fact that the workers are striking against the introduction of an inferior scheme for future workers. TGWU-Unite has rightly pointed out that if this division between existing and new staff is allowed then it will progressively undermine the future of the final salary scheme.

Stealing our money? Council Housing and union political funds

“The government is going down the wrong road and taking the wrong direction. There is no way we are going to concede the right to allocate their cash to Gordon Brown and the party headquarters when not all our members support everything that the government is doing. Not all our members support the Labour party and they would not stand for their money being used in this way. They would want us to disaffiliate if the government insists on doing this.”

Negotiating pay cuts - or, how to throw Gordon Brown a lifeline

Gill George, Unite NEC member, reports on her blog http://gillgeorge.wordpress.com/2008/04/07/union-negotiators-recommend-pay-cuts/ that UNISON and RCN walked out on the other unions in negotiations over pay in the NHS. They appear to have reached their own deal with the Department of Health and the NHS employers. Karen Jennings, UNISON’s national officer is reported as saying that “we will be asking our executive to consider recommending this deal to members as a well-balanced package in the forthcoming consultation.”

Greg Tucker

The trade union and political activist Greg Tucker died yesterday from throat cancer. Here are some brief comments to mark his passing.

I did not know Greg very well on a personal level, although I worked with him on and off for 20 years, mostly in the RMT. Greg was a prominent activist within the RMT as a guard and then train driver. He was Secretary of the Train Grades conference of the RMT, and had been a member of the union’s lay Executive Committee. He stood as a candidate for General Secretary against Jimmy Knapp (for the absence of anybody else prepared to do so), receiving around a third of the votes. We were delegates together on a number of occasions to the RMT’s AGM and involved in the various left formations.
 
A similar age to him, we were part of a generation which suffered a long series of defeats. Many of the people we knew and worked with were personally defeated and demoralised, and dropped out of political and trade union activity. Some abandoned their earlier political convictions. But Greg’s commitment was life long, whatever the conditions of the moment.

Greg could have had a ‘career’ but chose instead to organise workers as a lay activist in the workplace, where anybody who held positions of leadership was a natural target for management. Like many left wing activists he suffered victimisation (at the hands of South West Trains), though he, his members and the union eventually won his his job back. He considered such attacks to be an inevitable overhead of the struggle.
 
Although his politics changed to some degree over the years, Greg remained true to his youthful convictions and carried on his trade union and political work despite the depressing conditions under which we had to work for so long.  

The other thing that can be said about Greg was that he was someone who was widely liked and respected, despite operating in a movement in which sectarianism was exacerbated by defeats. In this environment some left activists lost a sense of proportion, treating people close to them on the political spectrum as if they were enemies. Greg in contrast was never personal or objectionable with people with whom he had disagreements, even sharp ones. He faced political abuse (directed at him) with a wry smile. The small-mindedness and narrow sectarianism of many on the left was alien to him.
 
His experience, good humour and gritty determination will be missed by RMT activists and members, and his political associates. His departure too early, in his 50’s, is a reminder to those of us of his generation to make the most of our time.

Buses: a public service, not a ‘business’

This is a letter to the Swindon Advertiser following a debate sparked off in their letters page.  

I don’t know whether John Forster-Heatlie has heard of climate change, but his view that bus companies which do not make a profit should be allowed to go “out of business”, would have the result of pushing more people into cars. Perhaps he doesn’t think there is a threat to the environment and society. Yet he must know that the state of Swindon’s roads is worsening, and is threatened by government imposed housing targets. He bemoans the very idea of “subsidies” but doesn’t appear to mind us all choking to death as a result of pollution, whilst the roads become ever more congested.  

“Ensuring the customer is happy” (or how the Post Office drives down wages in order to “succeed” in a liberalised postal market)

The ‘consultation’ by Royal Mail on closure of Post Offices was always a case of going through the motions. The closure programme has been pre-ordained. It’s an economic decision resulting from the government’s commercialisation of the service and the ‘liberalisation’ originating from the European Union. Sticking offices in WH Smith’s was clearly a means of getting rid of those oh so expensive PO staff with their scandalously high wages. 

Somebody has underlined this by posting a job advert on the Royal mail chat site, for sales assistant posts in WH Smith’s in Aldershot. With little sense of irony it says: 

“WHSmith is the new home of the Post Office in Aldershot.  To get the public’s stamp of approval (sic), we need a first class team to deliver the full range of post office services from within the WHSmith store.

Your ethos in life will be about ensuring the customer is happy and you’ll balance excellent product knowledge with the right selling conversations to ensure that every customer is aware of the great products and services on offer. You provide excellent service naturally & are ready to find the right conversations to drive sales growth with every customer. You will go all out to hit your sales targets whilst ensuring you are 100% accurate in your operational procedures. You enjoy learning new things and have a desire to keep up to date on product, operations & security. With an eye for detail, you’ll take pride in balancing your till every day and you’ll fully understand all the security processes and the checks that need to be made.” 

These lucky individuals can look forward to “great rewards”, WH Smith discount card and a contributory pension scheme “after qualifying periods”. 

What are the wages? As reward for “your ethos in life” of ensuring the customer is happy (even if they are peeved at losing their post office) you will receive the “great reward” of £5.82 an hour, barely above the legal minimum wage (now £5.52). 

One scribe on the Royal Mail Chat site, in the know, tells us: “I have mentioned WHS pay a few times now! The best bit is they pay different rates for different towns - Aldershot £5.82 (it was £5.35 in August but for some reason those that applied didn’t last long!) whilst Staines merits £6.62 - will be interesting what they offer for Woking when that goes!

BUT the BEST bit is WHS offered ex Aldershot PO’s full POL (Post Office limited) rates £9.92 when they found they couldn’t keep staff - but they had all found better jobs!” 

So there we have it: 30p an hour above the minimum wage will undoubtedly improve the service to the customer! Experience, of course, tells us that turnover of staff will be high. Closing Post Offices will achieve one thing – losing experienced staff. This is just another example of New Labour and the European Union’s neo-liberal dogma being imposed in the face of real life experience.