The Socialist 30 January 2013

NHS workers resist cuts

NHS workers resist cuts

Privatisation: Bleeding the NHS dry

Heatherwood hospital campaign shows determination

East Midlands: Campaign forces retreat on ambulance station closure

Life as an NHS worker: bullying and stress

Cameron takes a gamble by threatening EU referendum

Austerity's utter failure

Taxing words from Cameron?

Aaron Swartz: a fight to free information

Them & Us

Southampton councillors have a choice ... Don't vote for cuts!

Hull councillors ready to vote No

Brighton's Greens vote for cuts in workers' allowances

Labour meltdown in Stoke-on-Trent continues; and Unison withholds funding

Stop Sheffield children's centre closures

Twelfth day of strike action by Tyne and Wear metro cleaners

DfE strike ballot

London teachers call for strike action against Performance Related Pay

Workplace news in brief

Fired up by Fire in the Blood - a story of big business cruelty and neglect

Jumping through hoops for a job

Shrewsbury 24: What is the government hiding?

Wales conference - confidence in socialist ideas

Server appeal: Members provide a huge boost to our resources

Socialist Party National Congress 2013

PO Box 1398, Enfield EN1 9GT

020 8988 8777

[email protected]

Link to this page: https://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/750/16053

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DfE strike ballot

Robbie Faulds , PCS education group president, personal capacity

Members of the PCS union working in the Department for Education (DfE) are balloting for strike action, and action short of a strike, in opposition to plans to close six out of 12 offices and slash 1,000 jobs (25% of the workforce).

Education secretary Michael Gove is using the department as an ideological testbed for wider civil service cuts.

Workers are demanding the department enters meaningful negotiations over the cuts and future workloads, as well as the withdrawal of a hated performance management system, which 97% of members rejected in a ballot at the end of last year.

Union members are in no doubt that the cuts will lead to compulsory redundancies, with the department making the bulk of the cuts over the next few months and with few other civil service jobs to apply for.

Those that remain in the department will face increased workloads, and will be left to explain to the public why many of the services they relied on are no longer provided.

There is already concern that the running of the DfE has become highly politicised, with Tory donors being brought in as non-executive directors and party hacks employed as special advisors.

PCS union members in other departments have expressed their support for any possible action in the DfE, fully aware that if the cuts are forced through then similar exercises are likely to follow in other areas.

PCS members are determined to fight back against the assault, and will seek to join up any action with other education unions if at all possible.

In this issue

Socialist Party NHS news & campaigning

NHS workers resist cuts