Public Pensions dispute: do we talk or walk?

Next week I will be attending a national UNISON briefing on the pensions dispute which will be followed by a meeting of those Service Group Executives (SGE) who have members in the Local Government and NHS pensions schemes.

The SGE’s is made up solely of elected lay members. I sit on the Community & Voluntary SGE and we will be debating and making a decision on whether to support the framework agreement on resolving the pensions dispute. I posted here my initial views on the agreement. Whilst I look forward to the briefing and the debate, the more I think about it, the more convinced I am, that we have to see this through. We need to carry on talking and not walk out of negotiations at this point.

Calling for walkouts is one thing but actually getting people out on strike nowadays is very, very difficult. First and foremost you have to convince members that this strike action is an absolute last resort. When all other attempts and means to negotiate have been exhausted. We were able to demonstrate this was the case for the November 30 strike. Members know that there has been concessions made and will expect us to try our best to put together a deal before being called out again.

We also need to raise our game. The strike on November 30 was a great success but in many ways we punched above our weight. We now know where we were strong and were we were not. We need to build upon our strengths and organise in those areas where we simply don’t have the membership density or steward structure to deliver.


Some unions appear to have rejected talking further and want to plough on with further strike action. If that is their decision then fair enough that is their choice, I for one will not interfere with their internal democratic decision making process. I do wish that others would do the same with UNISON! While I accept that some may argue tactically that the talks will not result in an acceptable offer and instead we should organise more strikes. I do not accept for a moment that to keep “Unity” we must refuse to negotiate until we get an offer that all 27 different trade unions in all their different pension schemes find acceptable. This is just nonsense.

The real threat to “Unity” will come if the unions start arguing amongst themselves with the loud mouths braying their “betrayal politics” mantra. The gains and real improvements that have been already won through the decision to strike and the ballot will be forgotten. Such division would only benefit this Tory led coalition. Pensions is not the only dispute that we are going to have to fight in the next 3 long years.

In my previous post I pointed out that some commentators are in danger of cutting off their nose to spite their face. I also think there is a risk that some in TIGMOO would rather indulge in sectarian infighting and point scoring, rather than carry out the hard work of recruiting members and stewards. Now, I am of course, a well known wallflower, who would not dream of indulging in polemic arguments with anyone.. but I would honestly rather be fighting the Tories and not other trade unionists.

However, I can’t resist this story. I met someone recently who told me how he had been hounded out of one of the ultra left sects because of the “crime of pessimism”. He was formally denounced for raising concerns about its support for a particular industrial dispute. As an experienced trade union activist he was surprised that his concerns were ignored because it did not fit the Party line. He was ordered to either repent his “pessimism” or face expulsion. In this case he didn’t talk he walked and left the sect before he was expelled. Needless to say that dispute ended in yet another glorious defeat...

London UNISON Regional Committee: The Health Brigade & the Forgotten Brigade

This morning was the quarterly meeting of the lay regional committee in central London. I was there in my capacity as regional finance convener and had to present the finance report.

Main picture is of the new banner for the UNISON Health Brigade (dedicated to the memory of John Kelly Chandler). On the left is Bromley Health branch secretary, Micky Crouch, and on right Deputy regional convener, Conroy Lawrence.

There were a number of important items on the agenda. However, I will concentrate on just two issues. The first was the prospect of national strike action over the 2008 local government pay offer. Recently there was a consultative ballot of the “final” offer by the employers of a below inflation and average earnings offer of 2.45% (3.3% for the most low paid). This is a sensitive issue and it is possible that we may have strike action in the near future. So, I will just say that sometime soon I will post some ideas on the future direction of the union with regard to such industrial action. We need to have a Plan B.

The second issue was the likelihood of the Labour Government and Labour Councils being re-elected in the next election. While I am largely indifferent to declared Trotskyite revolutionaries banging on about the ‘orrible quasi-fascist Labour government and how it deserves defeat.

I was somewhat “fed up” (to say the least) to hear a Labour Party member and UNISON NEC member openly rejoicing and gloating at the prospect of a Labour Party defeat at the next election (on the lines of “I told them so”) and looking “forward” to the prospect of rowing with a future Conservative government. He claimed that Labour had done “practically nothing” for working people while in power. Thankfully, apart from a couple of sneering acolytes, most were shocked at this out burst even if they were very critical of Labour.

Now, apart from the fact that this analysis is simply wrong and there is nothing inevitable about the prospect of a Tory victory and it is certainly nothing to celebrate. I think that such comments expose the banality of the extremist left with the Party. They would rather be in opposition than compromise “their politics”.

What is wrong with these people? Don’t they understand the difference that Labour has made to poor pensioners whose lives have been transformed by pension credits? How the minimum wage has put money in the pockets of the lowest paid. The huge amounts of money poured into Schools and hospitals. Yes, the government has made mistakes; yes they have not always been as bold and brave as we would have wanted. Yes, you have the right to criticise the government and work for change.

However, to dismiss everything that the Labour government has done and seemingly welcome future decades of divisive Tory misrule in council, assembly and government is simply and completely unforgivable.

UNISON conference – Trade Unionists are the “New Capitalists”?

Third day (Thursday) of UNISON National Delegate Conference. In the morning there was a row over the Standing Orders Committee report which led to a temporary suspension of business.

Then there was a briefing session on “Equal Pay” led by General Secretary Dave Prentis. Obviously equal pay is a key issue not least because trade unions, full time officers and even their branch activists have had legal action taken against them for allegedly failing to represent their members properly over equal pay agreements. I have heard that bailiffs have been knocking on the doors of branch secretaries at 6AM in order to serve summons on them personally. It was made clear that UNISON would back any branch officers under such an attack. We heard that “no win no fee” solicitors are evening encouraging people to join unions so they can sue them! I didn’t hear any mention of this wheeze the earlier debates on encouraging recruitment. Must remember to give that one a miss.

Baroness Howells gave a sobering and very dignified speech on the Bicentenary of the transatlantic slave trade.

Good debate on fighting the BNP. GLA delegate Alan Freeman made an excellent contribution, ending with something on the lines of “some people may not vote Labour because they can’t forgive Blair, but if they don’t vote Labour and let in the BNP they will never be able to forgive themselves”. This went down very well.

Ironically this debate was followed later that day by a UNISON rule change amendment during which a delegate referred to black people as “coloured” which quite rightly upset many people.

In another rule Change debate a proposal to “bash the NEC” and restrict their right to propose motions was knocked back.

After conference there was an official fringe event “Are we the “New Capitalists?” which I chaired with speakers David Pitt-Watson (see photo right - joint author of “The New Capitalists”, Chief Executive on Hermes, the in-house fund managers for BT and Post office, former assistant director of the Labour Party). Mo Baines, UNISON rep on the Greater Manchester LGPS scheme had to pull out, so National Officer Colin Meech stepped in. There were about 30 people present, mostly UNISON pension trustees or member reps on the Local Government Pension Scheme. I’ll try and write something up properly later about the fringe, but David’s precise and analytical arguments about workers capital and citizen investment were I think pretty convincing.

This is the Synopsis from Amazon about the book (£18.04 including postage.

“Thanks to the rise of mutual funds and retirement plans, the actual owners of the world's corporate giants are no longer a few wealthy families. Rather, they're the huge majority of working people who have their pensions and life savings invested in shares of today's largest companies. These grassroots owners have ideas about value that differ from those of tycoons or Wall Street traders. And corporate directors and executives are coming under increasing pressure to respond. The New Capitalists provides examples - from GE to Disney to British Petroleum - of enterprises whose shareholders have recently wielded their control in ways unimaginable just several years ago. Authors Stephen Davis, Jon Lukomnik and David Pitt-Watson describe how civil ownership will profoundly alter our world - including forcing the rise of a new species of corporation. It has already begun demolishing old rules and habits, laying the groundwork for a new "constitution of commerce." The authors spell out conventional thinking destined for extinction - and fresh strategies companies must implement to survive in the emerging "civil economy." They also outline how investors, advisors, activists, and policy makers can make their voices heard”.

A delegate remarked afterwards that usually fringe events are “for the converted” yet this event was a genuine attempt to discuss and debate new and radically different arguments.

Went for meal afterwards at the Regency Restaurant on the seafront near the Holiday Inn Hotel. A fantastic good value traditional fish restaurant. Recommend it, most of the restaurants around the conference centre are pretty poor (loads of visitors - no repeat business?).

Ended up at the traditional end of conference bash laid on by the Scottish region in the Metropole Hotel (also the joint Southern regions were having a function). The hotel was packed. See picture of me drinking with some members of the “1st Health Brigade” (led by Che Guevara look alike, Commander Mickey Crouch) and London Region Young members Convener, Sarah Lewis (sitting).