Monday 21 December 2009

Merry Christmas

It was heartwarming, and unexpected, to receive messages back from my all members e-mail, expressing support and thanks for what the BEC has done for members.

It really gives me encouragement to carry on.

Why not give some thought to standing for the BEC at our AGM next year?

Again, Merry Christmas & a Happy New Year.

Car park meeting

We held a car park meeting at Wellington Street on Friday for BDC staff who have beenor will be compulsoraly transfered to CCD.

The turnout was good and members are angry about what is being done to them.

It is pleasing to report that industrial relations have improved in the office & PCS was able to consult with members.

It is also pleasing to report that members who will not be involved in this dispute were asking how they could support members who were.

Hopefully we can negotiate a settlement; otherwise look for updates in the new year.

Monday 14 December 2009

Regional BFD ER Informal

I went to a meeting with the regional managers of BFD & CCD on Friday.

Unfortunately there were very few answers to our questions.

Wellington Street will start off as a contact centre answering benefit queries but after a couple of years this may change.

Benefit processing will be centralised but we don't know where.

We know that Wellington Street will be fully a contact centre by October next year but we don't know what will move when, although it won't be a big bang.

Hopefully we will have a better idea of the plans in the new year.

A strong union

If we are to fight off the attacks on members pay & conditions we need a strong union.

This means two things to me.

The first is that we have active, campaigning leadership at all levels.

The second is that we have as high a proportion of members as possible.

As an organisation we have recruited like crazy over the recent past & branch officials have not always been able to keep up.

Why not ask your colleagues if they are members and ask them to join up?

The slogan, Unity is Strength, may be old but it is still true.

It's all happening

Quite a lot of things have been happening at national level.

The government want to cap pay to 1% while clawing some of it back in increased NI contributions. The Tories would actually freeze our pay.

Meanwhile, Leigh Lewis decided to impose changes to the Civil Service Compensation Scheme without consulting PCS. Not only is this in spite of instructions from ministers it is probably illegal.

He has probably already made up his mind who will win the next general election & feels he can stick two fingers up to the current government.

It is time to fight back & PCS is already mounting a legal challange & calling for talks.

Only a strong union has a chance so vote for Mark Serwotka if you have not already done so.

Tuesday 1 December 2009

General Secretary - Your Choice

As you know the election is a two horse race.

Mark Serwotka is a high media profile, campaigning General Secretary who has a history of vigorously defending members interests.

His opponent, according to his election statement, has plans to do nothing and say nothing in the hope that it will all go away.

His mainstream is full of dark & choppy waters in which he would scupper PCS as an effective union and drown the hopes and aspirations of the members.

We need to send a strong message to the right wing 4themembers group and the government that the majority of members are not willing to be pushed around & not prepared to have our compensation scheme stolen from us.

Vote Serwotka.

Thursday 19 November 2009

BDC to CC Consultation

We attempted to hold our meeting on 20 November 2009.

PCS was merely trying to find out what members thought but management decided that we couldn't meet in the car park. As every meeting without facilities had been held there since the office had opened I don't think that anyone was surprised by the location.

PCS was evicted from the car park & forced to meet in a location that could have put members at risk.

PCS found a safer location & gave an update but due to the disruption were unable to take any feedback.

The branch enabled everyone to be back at their desk within 15 minutes & therefore not suffer any penalty.

If you have any comments please respond to this post.

If it is any way contentious I suggest that this is done from your home and not on DWP IT equipment.

BDC to Contact Centre Consultation Meetings

PCS have called further consultation meetings about the change.

Management nationally have refused to allow us time & a venue to hold these meetings.

We will find a way to consult the members affected.

Someone is listening to the concerns of staff, but it doesn't appear to be national management.

Reasons to vote for Mark Serwotka

The branch voted to nominate Mark to continue in his role of PCS General Secretary.

The branch therefore recommends that you vote for him.

See the leaflet, here, for some of the reasons.

Wednesday 18 November 2009

General Secretary Election

The nominations are in and there are two candidates.

In order to be nominated the candidates needed the support of 15 branches. Rob Bryson got 16 and Mark got 199 including ours.

This does not mean that the election result is a forgone conclusion. All members need to ensure that they vote to give Mark the mandate that he needs to take the campaigns forward.

Vote Mark Serwotka for General Secretary as soon as you receive your ballot paper.

Monday 16 November 2009

New Chief Executive for Jobcentre Plus

Darra Singh is making much of his attempt to learn about the business by going back to the floor.

His blog on the intranet suggests that maybe he is getting some insight into the customer experience.

We need to make sure that he is also made fully aware of how his staff are feeling.

He says that he is keen to hear our ideas so let's bombard him with e-mails about the transformation of the Leicester BDC to a Contact Centre.

Check out the DWP part of the PCS web site for the draft letter to send him.

The more we send, the more he will realise the strength of feeling.

Friday 6 November 2009

Bonfire Night

I couldn't blog over the weekend as I had my parents over for our annual bonfire night celebrations.

It is an odd celebration where we celebrate the failure of the gunpowder plot by simulating the explosion if it had been successful!

While I have no sympathy for a religious assassination, I do support freedom for people to practice their faith and the overthrow of the monarchy.

Like many events in history we all draw the lessons we choose from it.

Whatever conclusions you draw, make an excuse for a party.

Thursday 5 November 2009

Regional BFD ER Informal

I went to the BFD Regional meeting with PCS today.

The new regional director, Linda Regan, came across as reasonable and staff focused.

The bad news is that we have no answers to our questions.

We don't know when the BDC will become a CCD site, we don't know what services will be delivered from Wellington Street & we don't know who will be redeployed for health reasons, etc.

Hopefully we will have more answers at our next meeting in December.

I will let you know.

Monday 2 November 2009

General Secretary Election

PCS is a campaigning union for its members and for the wider movement.

It is regarded as a leading union in the TUC and a high profile voice for the working person.

We have won victories and prevented some of the worst management initiatives taking place.

This is in no small part thanks to the leadership of our current General Secretary, Mark Serwotka.

Our branch has nominated him to continue in post so I urge you all to vote for him when you get your ballot paper.

Mark has agreed to come and speak at our AGM in February next year. Let's welcome him as our General Secretary for another 5 years.

Beware of pickpockets

I was really pleased with the turnout at the two Wellington Street meetings about the Civil Service Compensation Scheme. There were over 100 people at the meetings altogether and the atmosphere was inspiring.

The changes mean that people who are made redundant or leave early could have their compensation reduced by a third, or even more in some cases. Not only will your job be less secure, but you will get less compensation.

Not satisfied with this we also face attacks on pay (our marvellous 3 year deal of 2%, 0% and 1% will be followed this year by between 0 & 1% and next year by 0%).

It upsets my sense of justice that bankers who brought the economy to it's knees continue to get high salaries and low paid civil servants, who are preventing the victims of the bankers from starving to death, get penalised financially.

We need to stand up against pickpockets, whether they are in the street or in the House of Commons.

Saturday 24 October 2009

Slimy Liar

I watched Question Time and was fairly pleased with what I saw, although I still believe that he should not have been invited.

The only way to expose Nick Griffin's views was to confront him, which was what happened.

He tried to imply that his party is not what we think it is by splitting hairs and evading the question.

He tried to deny being a holocaust denier, then tried to deny that he was denying being a holocaust denier and ended up looking shifty and foolish.

He denies being a nazi and a racist by making up his own definition of those words. Make no mistake, by the definitions in my dictionary, he is both.

He was not too happy as he wanted to be treated as a normal politician, which as a racist and a fascist, he is not. He claims that he was subjected to a lynch mob.

I find this very offensive. If he wants to know what a lynch mob is I suggest that he asks his friends in the Ku Klux Klan.

Thursday 22 October 2009

Leicester Contact Centre

I know the news came as a shock to many people but we need to act quickly if we are to try and influence the implementation of the move from a Benefit Delivery Centre to a Contact Centre.

PCS will try and fight this decision at national level (local management were no more involved in deciding this than we were) and we at local level need to highlight our hopes, fears and problems so we can try and sort them out.

Thank you to everyone who took part in the meetings on Wednesday. The issues highlighted are recorded below.

Everyone has a chance to comment on this blog so if you have any further issues or just wish to comment or let off steam please post a comment.

Please remember that this is a public forum, particularly if you post from a work PC.

Our issues:

1. Health Issues - what happens to those with health issues who cannot do phones ?
2. FTA - What is their position next week and long term in CCD ?
3. Surpluses - eventually there may be some who will take these members ? Especially as other business units in DWP and OGD's cutting headcount
4. BDC Leicester is large building can take up to 600 staff only 270 envisaged for CCD - will partners such as CMEC and Local service be pushed out to make a 'super CCD' with 600+ staff at some stage - what will happen to the other regional CCD's in Lincoln and Derby ?
5. Band C's mainly team leaders in CCD - what happens to appeals EO's ? Will those who do not want to team lead be declared surplus ?
6. Role of Band A's - less needed in CCD's job uncertainty - this is also same in othe parts of DWP so limited scope for transfer.
7. European CC Award - means little to members as pay not reflected by this award DWP lowest paid as usual.
8. Role for Social Fund on site in future ?
9. Will it be 8 till 8 like pension centres in near future ?
10 Need to know breakdown of staff by grade for new CCD, need to know training program for CCD.
11. RECIPE Role - handling any surplus DWP and OGD
12. Due to current pressures - management unlikely to release to other parts of DWP so members stuck in CCD.
13. Why spend money training on processing now if becoming CCD staff ?
14. Stress / uncertainty - need counselling / stress risk assessments.
15. Voluntary transfers - at members expense cannot afford as other regional BFD's will be expensive to travel to at own expense and if care issues not feasible anyway.
16. Not long enough to absorb significance of announcement should have been longer lead in to help members adjust.
17. Why not voluntary ? Some may prefer phones it should not be imposed.
18. BFD processors will sit tight 'as no one likes phones' there will be little turnover so less scope for transfer.

Sunday 18 October 2009

Postal Strike

I was going to write about next week's postal strike but after reading Victoria Coren's article in The Observer today I realised that I couldn't do better.

Click here to read it.

A Platform for Fascists

Nick Griffin, leader of the fascist BNP, will appear on Question Time this Thursday.

Some people think that as a democratically elected MEP he should be held to account in the same way as any other elected politician.

However, I don't believe that society should give a platform to racist fascists. A show such as Question Time will not allow time for taking anyone to task & will just give him time to air some well rehearsed sound bites.

The broadcast is likely to feature disruption from supporters & opposition to the BNP which will give Griffin an excuse to bang on about democracy.

Whatever he may say the BNP constitution bans membership from anyone who is not white, opposes any kind of integration or anti discrimination legislation & campaigns for the removal of non white people from our country.

Sadly, the BBC's decision is unlikely to change & therefore I will be watching as I will feel a need to know what he says in order to better counter his arguments.

Others will not be able to watch for fear of having to destroy their TV.

Whatever the result of the debate, PCS will oppose all racists and fascists. It is our policy that no one can serve the public as a civil servant with the necessary impartiality if they hold those views & therefore membership of the BNP should bar someone from working for the civil service.

Join the campaign.

Tuesday 13 October 2009

General Secretary Election

I've just come out of the meeting to nominate for the PCS General Secretary.

The meeting was small but the feeling was strongly that we should nominate Mark Serwotka to continue.

The meeting felt that we needed an articulate campainging General Secretary to head up a campaigning union.

With the threats that we face as civil servants this is not the time to elect someone who is not fully committed to defending members, nor for someone inexperienced at the top levels in our union.

This, of course, is only the first step. The important thing is to vote for Mark when you get your ballot paper (from 19 November).

Re-elect Mark Serwotka. The campaign starts here.

Friday 9 October 2009

ER Informal

I went to the latest CSD District Employee Relations Informal Meeting last Thursday in Northampton.

These regular meetings are for a frank discussion with district management about what is happening in the district and for an exchange of information. I think that these are open and constructive on both sides in our district.

In order for us to represent you we need to know what is happening in all sites. Please let a PCS rep know if there are problems and we can discuss it with management.

We discussed Revised Service Hours, staffing levels and potential estates problems when all our staff are recruited. Both PCS and management welcome more staff to help deliver an increased service in times of increasing registers and both sides recognise that space is tight and that we need somewhere to sit to deliver that service.

This could be an ongoing issue so if there are any problems with space or the alterations work in your site please make management and PCS aware of the problems.

We also had a frank exchange about the pressure that members felt to reduce breaks due to the numbers of people to see. We may not have agreed over the causes but both management and PCS were committed to staff getting the breaks which they needed, and to try and manage workloads more effectively.

If you want a fuller report on our meetings with management (locally we also meet with BDC management) please leave a comment and I'll see what we can do.

Tuesday 6 October 2009

Macho Posturing

It looks like I may have been wrong about the parties trying to outdo each other with job cuts. They are trying to outdo each other with pay freezes!

I thought that Labour was trying to set a precedent for lower paid civil servants by freezing the pay of civil servants on £50K+, but the Tories have outdone them.

A pay freeze for all band Cs and above & almost certainly band Bs on the max as well in 2011 is certainly taking on PCS.

We need to make sure that all political parties know that making people who are not well off even poorer is not a way to win votes.

Saturday 3 October 2009

Civil Service Compensation Scheme (yet again)

The branch is trying to organise consultation meetings with all staff about the CSCS.

All members are encouraged to attend.

You will get paid time off of up to an hour to take part.

These meeting should take place in most workplaces in the near future, ask your local rep for details.

CMEC

I was interested to read that the contract to destroy that fine example of Leicester's industrial heritage, the bowstring bridge, had been awarded to CMEC.

I did wonder why the Child Maintenance Enforcement Commission had decided to branch out into demolition work, but they have been trying to demolish many of the terms & conditions of our members since inception.

It is thanks to the robust negotiations of PCS (including our very own Dave Richards) that CMEC management have not got very far.

FOOTNOTE:
The demolition firm is not really anything to do with the successor to the Child Support Agency.

Sunday 27 September 2009

Civil Service Compensation Scheme (again)

In my opinion (see below) the Government are getting ready for job cuts and in order to make it cheaper they plan to cut the benefits payable top our members on redundancy.

Don't just sit by and let it happen - join the campaign.

Keep up to date by reading the PCS web site and e-mail a reply to the cabinet office.

See http://www.pcs.org.uk/en/campaigns/cscs/ for details.

Job Losses

It looks like a government of any persuasion would be keen to see jobs cut in the public sector.

Conference season will see all the parties engaged in a bidding war to see who can sound most macho when it comes to public sector job cuts.

It seems to me that when in a recession with large numbers of people out of work that the last thing any government should be doing is putting more people out of work. This can only result in less tax being paid, less money being spent to buy goods and services and more being spent on benefits.

This doesn't even take into account the fact that more people need public services when the economy is not doing well.

The councils are already getting in on the act - Leicestershire are planning to cut heavily which will deprive the poor of services while the better off will be even better off by not having to pay any increase in council tax.

We need to stand up for public services, not just for selfish reasons (our jobs) but for selfless ones. We really do make a difference to people's lives.

Friday 18 September 2009

Civil Service Compensation Scheme

The Government intends to tear up the longstanding agreement on compensation.

The cynical amoungst us may think that this is just to save money when making lots of civil servants redundant.

Please check out the PCS web site for details http://www.pcs.org.uk/

Women Chainmaker's Festival

I was lucky to attend the festival last Saturday at the Black Country Living Museum.

The weather was fabulous and there were stalls, a march in period costume and a full programme of entertainment as well as the museum to look round.

The festival is to remember a group of women chainmakers in Cradely Heath in 1910 who went on strike to enforce a minimum wage. The tale of exploited women workers in sweat shops makes me think how little has changed.

It also shows that organised workers in active trade unions can make real achievements if we stand together.

It is a great day out for adults or families.

Try and attend next year

Updating the blog

It's not much of a blog if no one posts so I had better pull my finger out.

Summer is nearly over & I have had my leave so it is time to face the chalenges ahead.

I will make every effort to post regularly so keep checking back.

Tuesday 14 July 2009

Welcome to the branch blog

This blog has been set up as a forum for members in the branch where we can all discuss issues freely without the constraints of the EMP.

This doesn't mean that anybody can write anything.

Offensive comments are, of course, unacceptable from members, non-members or anybody else.

Members of the branch of all grades and viewpoints will have access to this blog so please bear this in mind.

Please also bear in mind that, unless otherwise indicated, the views are those of the blogger and not the view of the branch or PCS as a whole.

Chris Willars
Branch Secretary

Saturday 30 May 2009

Monday 4 May 2009