Surrey County UNISON

Below is a letter sent to the Surrey Herald in response to a nasty piece of gutter journalism by Dominic Raab making serious misrepresentations about the work of trade unions. Chris Leary, communications officer, picks up the issue and responds with something called “The Truth”, a strange concept to Tory MPs it would seem…

Dominic Raab’s little petulant rant about “militant unions” allegedly being subsidised by the taxpayers (“It’s time to start reining in the unions – starting with funds” Surrey Herald, July 7th) betrays two problems with the Member for Esher and Walton.

The first is that, for a “view from the House”, it fails to mention what work he has been doing on behalf of his constituents, which I thought was the point of such newspaper columns – for local MPs to report on the work they are doing in the House of Commons in the name of the people of Esher and Walton.

The second is that it is highly inaccurate. Let me take this opportunity to introduce Mr Raab to something called “the facts”. I understand that when it comes to trade unions, “the facts” and Mr Raab haven’t touched base for a while. I consider myself privileged to reintroduce the two, and hope that they don’t lose touch again.

The public do not “subsidise” the trade unions nor foot the bill for “union business”. What union business which is undertaken on employer’s time is business for which employers – private and public – are legally required to give time to. This includes, for example, representing fellow workers in disciplinary and grievance hearings; representing staff during consultations on service restructures, TUPE transfers to other organisations; health and safety; and lots more besides.

This is actually in the interests of residents, who I am sure would rather a small amount of their tax went to release union officials from their jobs to make sure that these are done properly, rather than pay out hundreds of thousands of pounds on Employment Tribunals, or paying out compensation to injured staff. I want the bulk of my council tax and income tax to pay for services – not on clearing up avoidable messes. So do residents.

Good employment relations rely on there being an equal footing between employer and employee. Unions help achieve this. They get staff involved in having their say about their working lives, and help staff channel discontent down the right channels and help find solutions to problems that work for both staff and employers. Unions that are free – as in freedom – to work with employers to ensure an equal relationship between worker and manager make for much more productive workplaces – something I am sure Mr Raab would agree to be in the ultimate interests of residents.

As for “militant unions” – strikes are always an act of last resort. If unions went to strike ballots at the first instance of disagreements or problems, then we would not be able to do anything else than to run ballots which are very costly for unions, not just in terms of money (since unions have to have outside organisations run and audit their ballots by law) but also in terms of time. Unions are here to negotiate on behalf of their members. We only take strike action where there employers are about to cause serious damage and to demonstrate how strongly staff feel.

In any case, the costs to employers to live up to their legal obligations is minimal compared to the amount of money that is spent funding Special Advisers, political assistants, and other such employees to be party political on taxpayer’s money, not to mention the amount that the Conservative Party received in “short money” when they spent 13 years in opposition. Not to mention the obsenity of parliamentary expenses, or the huge amounts of money wasted by government minister’s junkets. If Mr Raab is so keen to eliminate “waste” (as he puts it), then he should be asking Eric Pickles, Communities and Local Govenrment Secretary why he’s able to jet over to India, wasting hundreds of thousands of pounds of taxpayers’ money. Or is this sort of “waste” OK, Mr Raab?

But this is not the point for Mr Raab. His complains about union ballots not getting 50% support of union membership (a principle which, should it be applied to his own election as MP, would mean many of his colleagues losing their seats) is a sleight of hand to detract from the real issues facing government spending, the economy, and our local public services. The fact is that he is on an ideological mission to cut local public services. While Mr Raab was out attacking trade unions – representing 27 times as many people as the Conservative Party in terms of membership – his silence on the closure of Surrey Libraries that his constituents rely up on is deafening.

Rather than attack trade unions, organisations that the British public support time and time again, Mr Raab should pay attention to the real issues facing his constituents. Or would that be asking too much?

SOSiS Secretary Paul Couchman reports on the day Surrey public sector workers stood up in defence of their pensions.

“Camberley has never seen anything like this before” said Ted Truscoe from the NUT as a human stream of mainly young people with balloons, flags and banners marched around the town centre on their way to a rally at Camberley Theatre. There were placards and banners from NUT, UCU, ATL, PCS and UNISON and the new Save Our Services in Surrey (SOSiS) banner. At least six UNISON activists (myself included) had taken the day off as annual leave or TOIL so we could be there. Every other car hooted their support as they drove by and workers cheered from office windows and shop doors all along the route.

When we arrived at the rally, I was taken aside (as I was chairing the rally) and told we would have to do two sittings as the hall only holds 140 and we had over 300 outside! All this from an organising meeting attended by a handful of reps from the striking unions hosted by SOSiS only a few days before.

In the two rallies, all the speakers were local leaders from the striking unions, many of whom had never done anything like this before. Every call for further action got thunderous applause and the mood was certainly there for an even bigger, wider, public sector strike in the Autumn school term. Every speaker called for the other unions to come on board. As Secretary of Surrey County Council Trade Unions (SCCTU) I was proud to be invited to chair these historic meetings which I believe mark the start of the rebirth of the trade union and labour movement in the Surrey area. I said “As Branch Secretary of UNISON I feel frustrated at not actually being able to strike on the day alongside the other unions today but I look forward to balloting our members soon so we can be part of this fantastic movement to defend pensions and fight this vicious and cowardly government”. I called on all the strikers present – “don’t just go home from today and back to work to do nothing till the next strike day – get organised, become active in your union, get political and challenge the status quo”

The previous night saw an eve-of-strike rally organised by the Redhill Anti-Cuts Group, where I had spoken alongside strikers from NUT and UCU, offering my support (in a personal capacity) from UNISON. A representative from Reigate and Banstead UNISON was at the meeting and she told us “My phone hasn’t stopped ringing from members wanting to know why we are not striking tomorrow!”

On the morning of the strike I went with Annie Towsend (also from UNISON) and Alan (from the POA) to support the PCS picket line at Woking Tax Office. By 10 o’clock there were 25 of us on the picket line and then we were joined by even more PCS pickets from the job centre up the road. A Royal Mail van pulled up outside and we waited with baited breath to see what the postie would do. He jumped out of his van, strolled up to us and said ‘Solidarity Comrades’ and punched the air. By 12pm we had jumped into our cars and headed for Camberley, where we were taking bets on how many would turn out. Bearing in mind a previous Saturday Demonstration in Woking against the cuts had been 150 strong, most bets were on 50-100 turning out on a weekday strike action demonstration. There were six times the lowest estimate!

Whilst on the PCS picket line I asked a couple of strikers for a few words:

Thelma Snelgrove – Deputy Branch Secretary of PCS Woking HMRC branch:

I’m here with my members represnting PCS because I believe there is an alternative to cuts. We should be investing in public services to help the economy to grow.

There is a £120bn tax gap to be collected. If there was the resources and the staff to collect these taxes we wouldn;t have to make the cuts.

The government would have the public believe that our pensions are gold plated but the average pension in the civil service is £4000. The government continues to inflate this figure by including the pensions of senior civil servants and permanent secretaries. The government is trying to demonise the civil service by using every opportunity to attack us in the press and to put down hard working low-paid staff.

The strike here is probably 75% solid (we won’t know exactly till tomorrow). There is a strong and confident mood for action.
When workers join the civil service they accept low salaries because of the pension scheme and the civil service compensation schemes but the government are trying to unilaterally change our contracts in the race to the bottom.

People out there don’t realise just how low paid civil servants are – they just think of Whitehall. In fact, when the minimum wage was introduced many of our members had to have their wages increased to get the minimum!

If the government doesn’t listen we need further action in the Autumn with a view to wider public sector national strikes.

Mike Briggs, Branch Secretary from the same branch added: There are many people here striking this time who have never taken action before.

Rosa Briggs, Branch Chair of the Surrey DWP Branch of PCS said:

We are standing against all the cuts – basically to protect our welfare state and to fight for jobs and services. Our members support the campaign. Some members who have never been out before are on strike. The pensions issue has moved them to take action – previously they have crossed picket lines.

I think the rest of the unions need to be united and ballot their members to join this strike campaign.

Today has been excellent. So many members of the public have supported us, honking their car horns, smiling, waving and giving us the thumbs up!

Alan Guest, Branch Chair of the Prison Officers Association (POA) at Send Prison, Woking, had taken the morning off work to support the picket and brought solidarity from the POA who were holding lunchtime protests around the country. He sent the following message:

The governments decision on the Hutton report is no doubt going to bad news for us all.

Prison Service staff are members of the civil service pension scheme and this is no doubt going to be brought to a halt, with new schemes being introduced. Which will no doubt increase employee contributions, introduce a higher retirement age and lower final pension rights. It also seeks to introduce caps to medical inefficiency compensation payments and further reduce medical retirement benefits.

Prison Service staff are mainly made up of uniformed prison officers, however recently the POA learnt that the Ministry of Justice was ignoring a recommendation in the Hutton report that uniformed staff should retire no later than 60, this includes police, firefighters, military and other uniformed roles, but clearly those of us who look after, and keep society safe from the most dangerous people are not considered under this recommendation.

Since 2001 prison officers have been required to take an annual fitness test, however this makes no allowances for age or gender, with a 20 year old taking the same test that as a 60 year old. We believe that by introducing this test it means when staff reach 50-60 years old they will find it increasingly hard to pass this test, and will be subject to dismissal, no doubt before they can accrue full pension rights.

The Hutton report makes no concessions on senior civil servants, MPs or ministers, these are the biggest fat cats in the civil service. One example is Ex- Director General of the National Offender Management Service, Phil Wheatly who in 2010 retired on an £85k a year pension, with a £245,000 lump sum (NOMS Accounts 2009/10) this particular fat cat now works for G4S helping them make profits from crime. It is no coincidence that G4S won the contract to privatise Birmingham Prison.

My latest pension statement says that after 38 years service I will get a £9k annual pension, hardly the gold plated gravy train portrayed by the government and Tory press, which has no doubt whipped up a generation of Daily Mail readers against us. My contract clearly states a retirement age of 60, how this government can say they will just legislate to change that is abysmal, if we breach our employment contracts the consequences are harsh, its about time they realise that those contracts go both ways.

Public sector workers must unite to defend our pensions and terms and conditions, local government workers and civil servants do not deserve to pay the price for the mistakes of rich bankers.

Yours in Unity

Alan Guest
POA Branch Chair – HMP Send

The new issue of Organise, the newsletter of Surrey County UNISON, is out now. It is being emailed and mailed to all members, but you can download it by clicking on this link.

This 20 page bumper issue includes a special Editorial, reports from the UNISON National Women’s Conference, the TUC March for the Alternative in March, and the UNISON National Young Members’ Weekend, updates on the Surrey Pay claim, office closures and car parking, Academy Schools, Student Finance and much more.

If you’d like to write something for Organise, then drop us a line – it’s your magazine!

UNISON are holding a meeting at 5.30pm on Wednesday 25th May at the UNISON office, Ranger House, Walnut Tree Close, Guildford, GU1 4UL (just next to Guildford train station). This meeting is an opportunity for library staff, local ‘Friends’ and interested councillors to raise awareness of the issue and continue the Surrey wide campaign. Speakers at the meeting will include the famous children’s Author – Alan Gibbons and the Library Campaigners National Secretary – Andrew Coburn. If you are interested in saving Surrey County’s Library Service then please come along and show your support.

We are sure you are aware of the recent announcements that 11 of Surrey County’s libraries are under threat of closure if volunteers are not found to run them and that the mobile library service is being axed.

Surrey County UNISON is campaigning to try to save the library service in Surrey and its knowledgeable staff.

We are also extremely concerned that there will likely be plans to make further cuts too in the library service in the future. It is seen as an easy option to make savings in this service, however the negative impact this will have on local residents lives has not been taken into consideration.

Many residents, especially the elderly and young parents, use the mobile service or their local library as a lifeline. Without it they will not have the option to continue reading or socialising in their communities. Many residents in remote areas do not see anyone to talk to from one week to the next, if these services are lost they will be left with long empty days to fill with no ability to get out, speak to people or read books in their homes.

So far UNISON have lobbied the full council, visited each of the libraries at risk, arranged petitions to be signed and we are now arranging a meeting for all library staff to discuss the next steps of the campaign and hear your concerns.  Some of the local ‘Friends’ groups have told us that they will step in to save their library, but that a library staffed by volunteers cannot make up for the loss of trained and committed staff.

UNISON members on Surrey Pay will have recieved a copy of the latest Newsletter containing information on the current pay negoiations, and why UNISON and GMB have walked out of them. You can download a copy of the latest newsletter by clicking here.

Contained within that mailing was a ballot form on whether you accept the Council’s pay offer. It is vitally important that you return this ballot paper as soon as possible, and certainly before April 22nd. If you haven’t recieved a ballot paper, or if you need a new one, please email the office (unison@surreycc.gov.uk) or call 020 8541 9091.

Yesterday, over 50 UNISON members and supporters lobbied Surrey County Council as they voted to accept a massive programme of cuts to jobs and services. Dubbed the “cutter’s charter” by Surrey County UNISON, the largest union for SCC staff, the proposals included cuts to the library service (including the abolition of the mobile library service), cuts to Youth Services (including huge losses of qualified youth workers and youth centres) and replacing qualified, trained social workers with unqualified support workers.

UNISON activists from across the Council spoke to BBC Radio Five Live about the cuts, and you can listen again on the BBC iPlayer by clicking here and jumping to 1:40 on the timecode at the bottom.

We will continue the campaign against cuts, with specific campaigns around the enroaching threat of Academy Schools and cuts to youth services, with our members and allies in Save Our Services in Surrey.

Download this flyer in Adobe Acrobat format, plus special flyers for libraries, social care and youth services

On the announcement that Surrey County Council are looking to cut nearly 650 full time equivilant jobs, Chris Leary, Communications Officer for Surrey County UNISON, the biggest union for SCC staff, said;

“Surrey County Council definitely did not tell us of these job cuts. In fact, at a meeting with HR to talk about current job losses and potential redundancies they clearly gave the message that they were looking at 2-300.

“When the public realise what this means in reality – when their parents and grandparents lose the services they rely on such as mobile libraries – when vulnerable adults cannot get support because there are not enough qualified staff – when young people turn to crime and deliquency because their youth services have gone – the people of Surrey will not just stand idly by and let the politicians decimate services.

“We will defend our members jobs and support them in whatever action they choose to take – including lawful industrial action.

“Hundreds of local people got involved in the successful campaigns to save Shortwood Infant School in Staines and Brooklands FE College in Ashford last year – before the big cuts were announced by the new ConDem government. UNISON were proud to be part of those campaigns and we will support anyone fighting to save a vital local service. Our members are mobilising for the TUC’s demonstration on March 26th already. We will also be lobbying the Council from 8.30am on Febuary 8th. These cuts are not inevitable.”

The Surrey County UNISON Annual General Meeting 2011 will be held on Wednesday 19th January 2011 at 12.00 noon at the Runnymede Centre, Addlestone. All UNISON members who work for Surrey County Council will have paid release time from work in order to attend, and you should liaise with your manager to get the time.

We have also published the Annual Report for 2010, which you can download in Adobe Acrobat format by clicking here.

Despite the snow and the cold weather, a good gang of Save Our Services in Surrey managed to make it out and lobby Surrey County Council’s full meeting on Tuesday 21st December. Good contingents from UNISON, the Community & Youth Worker section of Unite, and students from Surrey University made it down to County Hall to lobby the Cabinet as it voted through lots of Public Value Reviews.

The coming months in 2011 will be a make-or-break time for the fight against cuts. The TUC’s march in March is welcome (though we still feel that it should be much earlier). They have produced an excellent guide for campaigners which you can download by clicking here.

Futher events are being planned, and we’re still working out the final details for our Day School later in January. Keep your eyes peeled.

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