South Gloucestershire Unison strike. Photo: Roger Thomas
South Gloucestershire Unison strike. Photo: Roger Thomas

Dan Smart, South Gloucestershire Unison secretary (personal capacity)

Unison and National Education Union (NEU) members, facing job losses and key services being slashed, lobbied South Gloucestershire Council budget meeting. They were joined by a crowd chanting: “When they say cut back, we say fight back”, as councillors voted through millions of cuts to vital public services.

A new Lib-Dem/Labour coalition took over South Glos last May, which was a cause for some optimism among Unison members. But this has rapidly faded, as the new administration continues the previous Tory administration’s four-year cuts budget.

Unison members in mentoring service Breakthrough spoke about the horrendous blow closing their service is going to have on vulnerable people. They movingly pointed out how short-term savings are being made at the expense of people’s lives.

Service users will face a much poorer quality of care under a private provider, at much greater expense to the council in the long term.

As well, libraries are set to be slashed by half a million; One Stop Shop hours are being reduced, limiting access to advice and frontline services; housing services are losing officers, in the midst of a housing crisis, and in a situation where migrants are camping outside the council building, desperate for accommodation.

South Glos Council has been subject to 14 years of Tories austerity. But now it feels even worse.

We are down to the most vital services being cut. And we are only one year into the four-year budget.

This was the first lobby of South Glos Council in many years – a key step in building a movement which can defeat all cuts.

We are developing reps, officers and union activists – many are new to these battles –prepared to take on councillors who vote for cuts. Adult social staff and bin workers in South Glos have taken strike action in the last year (see socialistparty.org.uk).

If councillors continue to sell off and tear down the services that working-class people have fought hard for, our chants will only get louder and louder.

Unison will continue to fight against every cut in South Glos. And the Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition (TUSC) will be standing hundreds of candidates around the country this May to make a stand.