The Socialist 25 May 2011

Unite to stop the cuts

National shop stewards conference - Unite to stop the cuts

As the cost of living soars...: 'We are going to fight back'!

An offer we must refuse

Why Liverpool needs a needs budget

Showing an alternative to cuts in Dorset

Battling to defend the NHS

NHS demo in London needs to be a step towards united national strike action

Unison leaders failing to adopt the demands of health workers

Challenging Tories' plans to kill our health service

PCS conference: developing strategies for struggle

UCU facing battles on all fronts

Southampton city council workers strike

Three day strike to stop redundancies at Sheffield College

Firefighters discuss strategy to fight cuts

Workplace news in brief

"We are London Met Uni, not EasyMet"

Atos Origin - profiting from pain

'Slutwalk' protests: Women reject sexism

Slave labour schemes must be resisted

Leadership failed print workers in vital battle

Review: The street that cut everything

McNulty's railway report: not 'value for money'!

Care homes privatisation hits the elderly

News in brief

Eyewitness report: Mass youth protests in Spain

Ireland: 'Reclaim the unions'

Greece: Resist bosses' agenda and the far right

PDFs for this issue

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Link to this page: https://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/672/12101

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An offer we must refuse

Local government workers across Britain are facing attacks on their jobs, pay and terms and conditions as part of the Con-Demolition of public services. Labour-led councils have agreed to do the government's dirty work by implementing cuts. Instead, councillors should stand up against cuts by setting 'needs' budgets and demand the required money from central government. The money is there - £120 billion in tax goes unpaid by the rich every year, more than the £81 billion in total the government wants to cut.

But the opposition to these cuts is growing. A local government worker in Waltham Forest, north east London, shows how workers are fighting back.

On 3 May all local government workers in Waltham Forest were issued with a "Terms and Conditions Review". The document states that the council intends to cut £3 million from our wages and informed us of its intended 'options':

No pay for the first three days off sick or reduce occupational sick pay from 100% of salary to 80% of salary for all sickness absence
Reduce sick pay entitlement to a maximum of three months full pay and three months half pay
Reduce the gross salary for all staff by 2%
Reduce the gross salary of all staff by one incremental point
Cease all standby payments - standby duties to be treated as a contractual requirement of the role
Cease all weekend enhancement

The council proposes to opt out of the National Agreement on Pay and Condition of Service, thereby potentially initiating local pay agreements.

The document is peppered with words such as "consultation" and "inclusion", yet it opens by telling the entire workforce that we have been put on notice of dismissal! We have from 6 September to 4 October to accept or on 7 October, like a scene from The Godfather film, we are going to be given 'an offer we can't refuse', ie dismissed and re-employed on a new 'ready to privatise' contract.

The document states that the cuts package was approved by the council on 8 March. We know because we were there lobbying councillors.

The council has put us through nine council phases of cuts in the last 18 months. Waltham Forest Unison's branch committee has initiated a campaign through the branch to get people to a general meeting on 1 June to discuss industrial action.

At the recent anti-cuts meeting in Waltham Forest everyone agreed to build support for our Unison meeting. This can help gain support from the local community for industrial action to defend our services.

We have agreed to do joint activity with civil servants in the PCS union, teachers in the NUT and UCU lecturers for their pensions strike on 30 June. Joint union strike action is the logical step after the 500,000-strong TUC anti-cuts demo on 26 March.

Workers everywhere should be encouraged to do something on 30 June, whether participating in centrally organised demos or lunch-time protests.

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