Angela Rayner for Manchester Withington

Great video from Angela Rayner who is running to be selected as the Labour Candidate for Manchester Withington.

Angela is a former care worker and now the UNISON branch secretary for Stockport Local Government. I have known her for a number of years now and I think she is exactly the sort of person we ought to have in Parliament representing ordinary working people.

Newham Jobs & Apprenticeships Fair 2013

Last year's event was packed out. Well done to Lyn and Stephen for organising this years event as well.

Lyn has asked people to publicise this event as "We hope the fair will bring employers together with potential employees and provide advice on writing CVs, finding jobs online and interview skills to help people find work".

UK Welfare Spending 2011-12 (Fact Not Fiction)

Hat tip for picture and great rant to Jon Leighton"Ok, I can't keep my gob shut any longer. I'm sick to death of seeing posts on Facebook about benefit scroungers. Do you know the figures? Because if you did you might see it in another light.

Did you know that only 3% of the benefits budget goes to people seeking work? 53% is pensions and other related old age benefits, 18% is Housing Benefit (which currently goes directly to landlords) 18% is working tax credits, and the rest disabled benefits and other bits and bobs. (And by the way, the Government figures say the fraud rate for disabled benefits is 0.3%)

In fact, the majority of folks claiming housing and council tax benefit ARE IN WORK.

I could write a bloody essay on this because I deal with it everyday. Our benefits budget is not out of control. According to the OECD Britain's benefit bill per head is nowhere near as generous as half the countries in Europe. (And unemployment benefit is particularly stingy compared to most)

The vast majority of folks just want to get on but minimum wage jobs are not paying enough. (This might explain why at work we're seeing working people going to bloody foodbanks every week.)

This shitty government is turning people against each other. And it's totally unwarranted. Yes, welfare needs reforming but you don't do that by kicking people out of their homes, stigmatising them so that they get spat at in the street and driving them to suicide. - these have all happened so far.

In the last two years 80% of people applying for housing benefit were all working. We can reform welfare by bringing in a living wage so that people don't have to claim benefits to get by. At the moment the welfare budget is subsidising low pay and private landlords on a grand scale.

When you see a post that puts the boot into benefit claimants, think twice before you like it because let me tell you, we are ALL only three mortgage payments away from disaster.

(If anyone wants the sources of the figures I have quoted, I will only be too happy to provide them)

I've attached a pie chart from 2011 to give you an idea. Figures will have changed a bit."

Why you should join your Pension Scheme

This post is based upon a speech I made at the Newham UNISON Local Government Branch AGM held at East Ham Town Hall last month. I was there as the London Regional Finance Convenor and had been asked to speak on why members should join the Local Government Pension Scheme.

When speaking about pensions the 1st point you must make is explain that the reason for having a pension is actually quite simple – it is about preventing poverty in old age. Poverty at any time in your life can be a pretty miserable experience but at least if you are young then you have time to better yourself but if you are poor and elderly then it is far more difficult if not impossible.

I am able to point out that one of the most depressing things I see as a Housing officer is visiting pensioners in winter, who live in one room freezing in front of an electric fire. Who buy second hand clothes and live on out of date food, ashamed that they cannot afford to go on holiday or treat their Grandchildren.

2nd Point: Pensions are expensive. There is an old rule of thumb in the pension world that to retire on half pay and get a lump sum, you need to have the equivalent of 15% of your pay put into a pension for 40 years.

That is why it is so important that you start your pension as soon as possible and if you have the chance to join a decent employer scheme then go for it.

The 3rd Point: is to explain that company pensions are part of your pay and your terms and conditions. If you don’t join the LGPS you are losing the at least 12% of your total pay. Even in the private sector good employers will put at least 10% of your pay into your scheme. This could amount to hundreds of pounds per month, thousands of pounds per year. If you don’t join then this money is gone forever and there is nothing you can do to get it back. Not only that but you also get substantial tax relief on your pension contributions, with the government in effect paying 20 to 40% of your subs. So if you don’t join the pension not only are you cheating yourself out of thousands of pounds of pay but you helping the government save money by volunteering to pay more tax than you need to pay.

4th Point is you cannot reply on the state for your old age. The new Government Universal pension is going to be around the existing pension credit level (poverty line) of £144 per week. While some commentators think that a non means tested state pension at this level is too much and unsustainable, most of us would think that £144 per week (£7,488 per year) is no where near enough to live on. At age 65 the average male will live another 18 years and the average female 20.6 years. Living on the poverty line for the last 1/3 of your life is not going to be anyone’s lifestyle choice.

Some people say that their house or business will be their pension. I don’t think that they realise just how expensive it is to replace your income in retirement. If you want an extra £100 per week pension annuity (£5000 per year) with some protection against inflation you would need a lump sum of at least £150,000.

5th point: Finally with a good defined benefit pension such as the LGPS your pension is guaranteed, it increases in line with inflation, you are protected against ill health and disability and it will pay out for 10 years after your retirement (regardless of how long you actually live).

While there are good defined contribution pensions (where employers pay at least 10% of salary and provide ill health insurance) they are not guaranteed, can be very expensive to run and don’t automatically protect your partner or against inflation. If you have the opportunity to join a company DC that has employer contributions (or are auto enrolled into one) then you should normally do so. The only exceptions may be if you are on very low pay or near retirement and are likely to be dependent on housing and council tax benefits you may need further advice.

What we should be thinking about is setting up a new defined benefit scheme for the private sector based on the new look LGPS. The idea that there is no future for defined benefit schemes in the private and voluntary sector is simply rubbish.

I am more than willing to come to trade union or local Labour Party meetings to talk about pensions.
(hat tip LPFA for picture)

What twitter will look like on the day that Margaret Thatcher dies....

I've just learnt the news about the death of Margaret Thatcher. I will post on her another time. In the meantime hat tip Clifford Singer for "chart" and looking at all the silliness on social media this is so, so true.

Trade Unions Together Parliamentary Training School

Picture of Labour Party Deputy Leader Harriet Harman MP at the House of Commons last month with members of the TULO Training School for trade unionists interested in becoming Parliamentary candidates. It was an excellent course both in terms of delivery and the standard of participants (I obviously had slipped in somehow).

There were HGV drivers, postmen, supermarket check out staff, theatre nurses, taxi drivers, plasterers, care assistants, health inspectors, (and even a housing officer)....

I will post further on the course but I think it is fantastic that the affiliated trade unions are not just complaining about the unacceptable absence of working people in Parliament but are taking concrete and practical steps to do something about it.

A thousand trustees for the LGPS

This is an article I wrote on behalf of the AMNT for Professional Pensions on the future Governance of the Local Government Pension Scheme.

"The Public Sector Pensions Bill is currently on its way back to the House of Commons after being amended by the Lords. One of these amendments, accepted by the government, is that the proposed new Local Government Pension Scheme boards will have 50/50 employer/employee representation.

There are 101 separate council pension funds in the UK. At the moment most of details are still unclear but it is thought that board members will have similar powers and responsibilities as those of trustees in private sector defined benefit schemes.

Most existing LGPS schemes are supervised by elected councillors with often little or none beneficiary representation. If for example it is agreed that these new boards had ten members each, then there is a huge organisational and logistical challenge ahead. It is thought the new governance arrangements are planned to start in April 2014.

While many existing councillors may simply switch from existing committee panels to boards, they will have to be selected, trained and supported in the new arrangements. Employees will in many cases have for the first time the right to representation and full voting rights.

I have been an employee representative on a London LGPS since 1996. At first for many years I was called an "observer" on the pension investment committee. This meant that I had no vote but did have access to papers, attend beauty parades, training and could ask questions to advisors and fund managers. This changed and now I and one other employee representative have two seats and voting rights on the investment panel and a seat but without voting rights on the formal council pension committee.

I would point out that we have never felt the need to actually force a vote at investment panel. Like the vast majority of private sector pension trustee meetings, issues are best dealt with by consensus whenever possible. I don't expect that to change with 50/50 representation.

This is a huge step change for employees and the local government trade union Unison is already planning an ambitious recruitment and training programme for representatives. With a 19.5% total contribution cap it is now very much in the interests of employees and employers to make sure the fund is well run and efficient.

Professional advisers and fund managers will also have change the way they do business with the LGPS. The issue of the merger of LGPS is separate.

Everything will have to change to some degree. I am also an employer trustee on a private DB scheme and it has been a very different experience to that in the LGPS.

It is vital that we get the LGPS governance arrangements right. Not only are four million people in the UK members but it is collectively the biggest funded pension scheme in the UK with around £150bn in assets. Meanwhile some senior members of the government have privately referred to the LGPS as the British sovereign wealth fund and hope it will invest more in housing and infrastructure to kick start the economy.

The AMNT welcomes this development which puts to rest this governance anomaly between public and private funded DB. Can the government now tackle the appalling governance gap in contract-based defined contribution schemes?

John Gray is chairman of the AMNT DB working group"

If you are a home owner then you must of course be a vile mass murderer!

Hat tip to Red Brick for a brilliant post on the nasty, ignorant and bigoted coverage by the Daily Hates over the conviction of Mick Philpot for the manslaughter of his 6 children.

Now don't get me wrong Philpot and his accomplices are completely evil scum bags who need to be locked up for life but just because he and his family were on welfare does not mean that everyone who claims benefits are somehow potential mass murderers?

Dr Harold Shipman was a respectable GP, higher rate taxpayer and homeowner.

His housing tenure and source of income had nothing to do with his intent to mass murder 218 patients.

Cilcain and Moel Famau Walk Easter 2013

I had a busy Easter weekend visiting family in North Wales. It is lovely to see family (of course) but the highlight was this circular walk to the top of Moel Famau (see photo left).

The car park at Loggerheads Country Park was full so we started the walk at the village of Cilcain. The recent cold weather and heavy snow falls has caught out local farmers and I was startled to come across a field with at least 7 dead  sheep and new born lambs scattered amongst the landscape.

After a long slog we reached the summit of Moel Famau, the highest point of the Clwydian Hills, where the wind was as usual absolutely vicious. The views North, South, East and West were  fantastic. Downhill to Loggerheads was very steep and slippery but I managed to remain upright much to my surprise. The walk along the River Alan and the limescale cliffs from Loggerheads to Cilcain was spectacular.

I was born and brought up in Buckley, which is only a few miles away, and had spent many happy days when I was younger sledging in these hills when it snowed as well as hill walking with the cadets.

At the end of the walk we stopped off at the White Horse Pub in Cilcain and had a beer and said hello to Peter, the father of my fellow North Walian turned East Ender and blogger Ted

It’s criminal what this Government is doing to the victims of violent crime

Picture is from UNISON Greater London Health & Safety network meeting last week with guest speaker(4th from right back) Gerard Stilliard from Thompsons Solicitors. 

Every 3 months, following the meeting of our regional committee on safety, all London UNISON branch H&S officers are invited to attend a briefing by Thompsons on various safety related issues.

Gerard had been asked to speak about changes to the Criminal Injuries Compensation Scheme in 2012.

Now, I knew that this Tory led government, with the active support of the Liberal Democrats, had made changes to the scheme, but what I didn’t realise is just how bad these changes were, especially for those at work who are attacked and badly assaulted.

Gerard explained that under the new scheme, eligibility and awards have been slashed. Any tariff awards less than £2500 have been removed entirely. While compensation for the rest of claims have been reduced on average by 50%.

Which means that in the past if you were for example a healthcare assistant and you had been badly beaten up by a patient, which took up to 3 months to recover, you would have received under the old rules £1750 in compensation. Now you would get nothing.

In the past if you had been a teaching assistant and been assaulted and punched so hard in the eye by a pupil that it resulted in permanent blurred or double vision, you would have received £4,400 to £8,200.  Now you would only get 1/2 to 2/3rds of that amount. Remember this is for permanent injuries! Was £4,400 under the old system too much?

Even worse, it use to be the case that loss of earnings awards due to injury were related to what you actually use to earn before the assault. Now it is only at statutory sick pay levels.

So if a Park warden had been so badly beaten up by drunken yobs that he or she could never return to paid work. Under the 2008 rules if the warden was aged 50, earned £15,000 per year and expected to retire at 65 then they could have expected to have received £225,000. Under 2012 rules they would only get £67,000. A loss of £158,000.

The government has also made it far difficult to claim, reducing time limits, not allowing managers to report cases to Police and slashing time limits for appeals.

Of course it is not only employees who are suffering from these cuts but all victims of violent crime.

In a civilised society the State has an absolute duty to protect all its citizens from criminals and deal responsibly with the consequences of this criminality for those who have suffered from it. The only citizens this Government gives a damn about are the 13,000 millionaires who will be given £100k plus tax cuts in 4 days time.