Statement from UNISON NEC Members 6.10.21 (see the attempt to divide & destroy our union)

(See what happened on the day that the Ultra left tried to divide & destroy our union just when we are mobilising to call pay strike ballots in Health & Local Government. I will add my name)

 Statement from NEC Members following the NEC Meeting on Wednesday 6th October 2021. Anyone wishing to add their support or their name are more than welcome to do so. Thank you.

As NEC members who chose to follow the legal advice given to us at the NEC meeting on 6th October 2021, here is our report of what happened:

The Vice Presidents of the NEC, who are Leaders of the ‘Time For Real Change’ organisation, sent out a list of six resolutions to the NEC, outside of the established protocol, one at 5.30pm on Friday 1st and an amended version on Sunday 3rd October, and just days before our meeting. These items were not listed on the Agenda for the meeting.

Prior to the meeting all NEC members were sent written legal advice, sought through UNISON’s usual processes, which stated that four of the six resolutions were a breach of our Rules and unlawful. We were also given this advice verbally throughout the meeting.

The Vice Presidents’ resolutions sought to amend the rules of our union, outside of our usual rule book democratic process of our National Delegate Conference.

The Vice Presidents’ unlawful rule breaches aim to:

1). Remove powers delegated to the General Secretary – a fundamental breach of her contract and an undermining of her huge democratic mandate as our elected General Secretary

2). Bypass UNISON’s legal department and choose whatever legal counsel they wish, subverting the terms and conditions of our UNISON staff and ethical standards

3). Give the D & O and NEC more powers over disciplinary’s and suspensions

4). Allow members who are dismissed from their employment to remain a member of our union AND hold any office they were in, no matter if they have committed a serious offence or gross misconduct. For example, sexual harassment, or any discriminatory harassment or a violent crime.

We would, as would our members, expect our General Secretary to abide by the legal advice she has been given through the union and given the seriousness of the consequences of the advice we also followed that advice.

All six resolutions passed by a simple majority – we did not support any of them.

The Vice Presidents did not, at any point in the meeting, say that they had sought their own legal advice, even though they were asked on a number of occasions and again ignored those questions. We do not know what their advice says, why and when they sought it, who wrote it, what information was given when the advice was sought, or even who paid for it.

We believe the Vice Presidents and other NEC members who were elected under the ‘Time for Real Change’ banner or who now align themselves to this organisation are now openly attacking our union and our democratically elected General Secretary – the first woman to ever hold the position and who is honest, ethical and upholds the aims, values and objectives of our union.

We support the aims, values and objectives as laid down in the unions rule book and the democratically elected General Secretary and the staff of the union.

James Anthony

Josie Bird

Manjula Kumari

Chris Hanrahan

Sian Stockham

Sam Hemraj

Helen Firman

Ali Long

Katrina Murray

Tracey Wainwright

Sarah Crowe

Margaret McKee

Pat Heron

Edwin Jeffries

Gordon McKay

Catherine McKenna

Emma Proctor

Chris Tansley

Maureen Le Marinel

Nominate John & Denise for UNISON NEC Community seats 2021

 

(Nominations period opens 1 February 2021)

NEC Elections 2021: Community General Seat & Female Seat Nomination Request

John Gray                                                                                       Denise Thomas

24 January 2021

Dear Branch Secretary and Chair

Your branch is entitled to nominate candidates to the two Community seats for this year’s National Executive Council elections. We're asking that you put this request to your community members for consideration - John Gray for the General Seat and Denise Thomas for the Female seat.

We are standing on a platform to unite the leadership of the union. Our new General Secretary needs unity in the National Executive Committee not factions of politics fighting internally. A united leadership will ensure UNISON concentrates on taking on the government making sure our members don't pay for the cost of Covid and fighting their plans to divide public service workers over the pay freeze. We can't do any of that if we don't have unity in UNISON's leadership.

There's been a change this year in how Community seats can be nominated to. This guarantees that members of the Community Sector can have their say. Please ensure you consult with your Community Sector members in time for your Branch Committee to nominate. Both of us are more than willing to attend (virtually) any hustings you may arrange with your community members to decide upon your nomination.

Denise is currently the NEC member for Community (Female seat). Her background is working in the Voluntary and Community sector for the past 28yrs supporting adults with learning disabilities and works for a national organisation. She holds Regional positions as Branch Black Members Officer and Welfare officer for Ymlaen/Forward Cymru Wales. 

John is also currently a NEC Community member (General seat) and has been an activist in UNISON for many years and held a number of different branch and regional positions. He works for a large Housing Association and is its National Convenor. He is the former Branch Secretary and Chair of the GLR Housing Associations Branch.

Denise has served as a NEC member on Policy Development & Campaigns, Trustee for “there for you”, Labour link. Branch Resource working group and International Committee.

John has served as an NEC member on the Policy Development & Campaigns, Trustee on the UNISON staff pension fund, Chair of Investment Sub-Committee, National Labour link and Vice-Chair of the Industrial Action Committee.

Covid 19 Pandemic This past year has been the most difficult time in our lifetimes. AS NEC members we are so proud of our members for continuing to provide much needed public services and also UNISON activists and staff who have supported sometimes very frightened members and fought hard for adequate PPE and risk assessments. But the impact of the pandemic on our members physically and mentally can't be underestimated- proper support needs to be in place for those who got the country through the pandemic as we hopefully come out of this crisis

Austerity. All of us deserve decent wages and decent terms and conditions. Instead many of us are facing cuts in pay, reduced benefits and redundancies. Both of us as your NEC members will be working and campaigning even harder with branches and regions to oppose these measures. We believe that Community members must play our part in opposing further Covid related austerity.

Equalities: We welcome that public service employers have acknowledged systemic racism in their structures, procedures and in society. The pandemic has highlighted the health inequalities with women and Black communities impacted the hardest. UNISON should be leading campaigns to end the disgraceful health inequalities in this country and holding the government and employers to their commitment to end systemic racism. We also support the Community specific campaigns below:-

• Better funding & resources for branches that support Community member who often work for small employers and in isolated workplaces.
• No public money for “union busters”. Any employer that does not have a union recognition agreement should be barred from public grants or contracts
• Sector Wage Councils. Set up to decide the pay and conditions of all staff by collective bargaining including a real living wage minimum for all Community workers and agency/sub-contractors.
• UNISON Ethical Care Charter. All employers must be called upon to sign up.
• Better governance and democracy.  Many of our employer management boards are unelected and unrepresentative.
• Defend Pensions. Protect the Social Housing Pension fund and the Pension Trust from further cuts. A decent defined benefit pension scheme for all.
• Better health & safety at work in particular protecting members by supporting the UNISON “End Violence at Work” charter.
• Recruit & train more activists to support members

We believe that we both work together well as your Community NEC team. While Denise’s employer is a charity, John’s is a housing association, so we represent and complement both of the major sectors in the Community Service Group. 

You can contact Denise on denise_thomas2@msn.com or John on john.gray2012@icloud.com.

Denise Thomas & John Gray

♡ UNISON: because of the support they give me as a nurse