Thursday, October 27, 2011

SERTUC Regional Council 22 October 2011

Last Saturday morning I went to the South East Regional Trade Union Council (SERTUC) meeting at Congress House. This was before the UNISON International Seminar.

The forthcoming ballot and likely strike action on Public service pensions was the key topic. The President of SERTUC Martin Gould spoke first and in his speech he urged all the unions to remain united and not to fall out in oncoming battle and to work together.

The guest speaker was Assistant General Secretary of Unite, Gail Cartmail. Gail use to work with the Martin as T&G full time officials. Gail spoke about the 400,000 extra Children being forced into poverty by this Government’s policies. Britain is still a rich country not a poor country yet all these children will be living in poverty. The threat to the NHS from so called “social enterprises” such as Central Surrey NHS which has now been taken over by Virgin. How can there be a “jobs less” recovery? Why in Britain is it a legal excuse to sack workers to improve “profitability”. She has friends who are teachers in Greece who have had their pay cut by a third. No wondered there are such protests.

Some good news is that the European TUC is considering making November 30 an international day of protest. Next was a debate on motions which I did speak and will post about separately.

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