The election for the National Executive Committee (NEC) of the Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS), which organises workers in the civil service and privatised government services, opened on 16 April.
Voting for Group Executive Committees (GECs) – such as the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), Revenue and Customs (HMRC), the Home Office, Department for Education etc – begins on 23 April with an email ballot.
Socialist Party members are standing as part of the PCS Broad Left Network (BLN), alongside other lefts in the union, to put forward a fighting ‘coalition for change’.
The BLN in DWP says:
In DWP our pay is not keeping up with rising prices. We are under constant pressure at work due to lack of staff and micromanagement. Our conditions are under attack – for example the recent imposed changes to hybrid.
The current PCS DWP group leaders (in the misnamed Left Unity grouping – the same group that has a majority on the national executive) have shown year after year that they are not prepared to stand up to management.
It’s time for a change. BLN candidates are standing to rebuild a strong union in DWP so we can mobilise members to tackle the employer and fight to win.
We will fight for:
- Pay restoration
- No job cuts – 30,000 extra staff
- No office closures
- Flexible and hybrid working, and the end of rigid office attendance targets
- An end to compulsory late and Saturday working
- An end to outsourcing: bring outsourced staff back in-house
We oppose further attacks on claimants and benefits by the Labour government.
- BLN-supported candidates for the DWP GEC can be found at bln.org.uk
The BLN in HMRC says:
HMRC plans to create 7,900 new roles by 2030.
Yet new HMRC CEO JP Marks told the Treasury Select Committee that he expects HMRC to be “broadly the same size in 2030 as we are today”. It’s clear that HMRC will cut some 7,000 jobs over the next four years to balance the books. These cuts include privatisation – the transfer of telephony work to a private sector ‘managed service provider’.
BLN members in HMRC are part of an ‘Alliance for Change’ which won a majority on the group executive last year.
The Alliance for Change-led GEC:
- Supports reps against victimisation
- Fights to improve pay so that no HMRC workers are on minimum wage and all grades improve
- Argues against the use of our members in Surge for strike-breaking
- Fights to stop the job cuts and reverse privatisation
The GEC has now launched the ‘Better HMRC’ campaign to fight for meaningful change for members’ working lives and conditions. The government expects HMRC to collect more tax. This gives PCS significant political leverage backed by industrial strength to shift HMRC. BLN-supported candidates for the HMRC can be found at bln.org.uk
