TUC Congress 2024: Sunday

This afternoon at 4pm it was the start of Trade Union Congress 2024 in Brighton Conference centre. Congress will last until Wednesday. I am here as a UNISON delegate and was really pleased that the first motion was "Standing up for care workers" moved by a UNISON care worker, Sian Stockholm. This was passed unanimously. 

The President this year is Fire Brigade Union (FBU) General Secretary, Matt Wrack,who started his career as a firefighter in Silvertown, Newham. He spoke passionately about Grenfell in his address and was also in tears after the speeches about him in the "vote of thanks" for his past year as President. 

The address by sororal delegate from the Labour Party, was by former trade union lawyer, Ellie Reeves MP (sister of the Chancellor) .  She made it clear that while there will be differences between the unions and a Labour Government, Labour under Keir Starmer will remain the party for workers. Afterwards Matt presented Ellie with a TUC Gold Badge. 

While Akhator Joel Odigie, the general secretary of ITUC Africa also addressed Congress. He reminded us that Africa supplies Europe not only with NHS workers but precious metals for mobile phones and car batteries. He wished that Labour UK plans on rolling back zero hour contracts, fire and rehire etc were not also happening in Africa.   

Final item today was remembering union activists who had passed away in the last year.

I will try and post on Congress, speakers, speeches and fringes when I can. It is exciting that this is the first TUC in 14 years to take place at the same time as a Labour Government.

Workers' Capital Conference 2015

Yesterday was the first day of the 2015 Workers' Capital Conference, which this year is being held in London and hosted by the International Transport Federation (ITF). This global conference of union pension activists was organised by the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC), the Trade Union advisory Committee to the OECD (TUAC) and the Global Unions Federation (GUFs).

I was there as a UNISON trade union pension trustee alongside a number of our lay activists and national officers (see picture right).

This annual conference is the international forum for trade union and pension fund trustees on the stewardship of workers retirement funds. Trade union trustees sit on the boards of pension funds worth in total $32 trillion (I think this is $32,000,000,000,000!). Which is an eye watering amount of money and a huge responsibility.  The aim of the conference is to promote decent work, a sustainable future and secure retirement for workers.

It is great not only to meet and share knowledge with trustees from all over the world but also it is an opportunity for trade unionists to do what they do best - work collectively in the interests of all our members.

The conference theme is "Pressing forward: Putting the Workers Capital Agenda to Action".

You can check out my tweets on the first day of conference here https://twitter.com/grayee. I will post further on the conference which ends today.

The theme for Workers’ Memorial Day on 28 April

"The theme for Workers’ Memorial Day on 28 April this year will be: 'Protecting workers around the world through strong regulation, enforcement and union rights'. ITUC, the global union body coordinating the event worldwide, says it is also encouraging unions to use the slogan, 'Unions make work safer' on their materials.

For news, resources and updates on UK Workers’ Memorial Day 2014 activities, see the TUC 28 April webpages.

Ÿ For global coverage, see the ITUC/Hazards 28 April webpages and facebook page".

Hat tip TUC Risks E-bulletin.

Burma: We don’t want our Pay and Council Tax used to support the Military Junta.

I found out last night at the Tower Hamlets Council Pension Investment Panel, that one of our fund managers have £2.3 million invested in Total (the 2nd highest holding in that particular fund) and £1.3 million in Chevron (7th biggest holding).

I suspect that our other Global equity fund will have similar investments in companies who have trading interests in Burma. We also own shares in companies such as GlaxoSmithKline (the huge British based drug company) who according to the International Trade Union Confederation (ITUC – click on this link for a full list) has business links with the Burma.

Many members of the pension scheme are furious that their pension contributions and council tax are being invested in companies that support the Burmese military junta and allow the murder of unarmed monks and civilians who are peacefully calling for democracy.

This is part of a complaint that local Tower Hamlets resident, UNISON member and Head Caretaker, Tony Boyce, has sent off to his Labour councillors (seen left with his granddaughter).

“I have been a member of the Tower Hamlets pension scheme and a Council tax payer for over 20 years. I have lived in Tower Hamlets for all my life. I am looking forward to eventually retiring and then being able to spend more time seeing my grandchildren grow up.

I would like to think that I would be able to help them out with them going to college or leaving home and getting their own place. What I would hate to think, is that my pension (which is my deferred pay) is being paid out in part, out of money earned from investing in Burma.

Burma is a horrible military dictatorship, which kills and enslaves its own people. I think that due to sanctions and criminal legal investigations that the pension fund could also lose money if they continue to invest in Burma. I ask the trustees of my pension scheme to stop investing my money in Burma”.

The Labour Councillors present, Bill Turner (Chair of the Pension and Accounts Committee) and Joshua Peck (Cabinet and Lead member for Performance and Resources) asked for a full report on what companies the fund held that had business interests in Burma. I volunteered to send over the ITUC list.

At the same meeting we discussed the scheme signing up for the UN Principles for Responsible Investment (PRI)

Finally, to illustrate how difficult these issues are – I asked the Global Equities fund manager after he gave his presentation to the Council investment panel (who are quasi-pension trustees) about the financial risk of sanctions, boycotts, criminal prosecutions and the reputational risk of investing pension money in Burma. Surely, the pension fund was facing a financial risk of continuing to invest in Burma?

He argued that the proportion of Total or Chevron assets invested in Burma may appear to be a large figure (up to $1.2 billion) however; they are only a tiny part of the total assets of that country. So if they lost money over Burma it would arguably not make that much of a difference to the company share price (I disagree).

Also, this fund manager is what they call a “quantitative” investor. That is they try to emotionally detach themselves from the companies that they invest in and only concentrate on the financial “fundamentals” (balance sheet, long term profits, market share, share price compared to profits, orders etc).

They actively invest in companies where they think the fundamentals are sound but where due to “market sentiment” the price of a company is lower than they should be.

(I accept that I have probably not adequately explained this properly, remember the usual health warning, this is my report back to members, my interpretation, not that of the Tower Hamlets Pension fund)

So we may have this crazy, crazy situation where some investors think that now is the time invest in Burma because many investors are pulling out on political sentiment rather than economic fundamentals

Personally, I think since it is now accepted that owners of capital in modern day democracies won't make money out of trading in opium then equally they should not think it is acceptable to make money out of Burma.

Danes take on Burmese Military collaborators

It was good to receive a welcome email today via the International Trade Union Confederation and Committee Workers Capital. The Danish pension fund ATP, which every working person in the country has to pay into (3 million people in 2005 with assets around 50 billion EURO) - has just announced that it will dis-invest from all oil companies that deals directly with Myanmar Oil, including Total. As well as any other companies that fail to comply with EU sanctions. Apparently this is 100 million EURO of shares.

I can’t find any link to confirm yet but it seems genuine. Check out Tom at Labour & Capital who has been following the British “dirty 32” who have trading links with Burma.