Saturday 15 October 2011

Mark Serwotka speaks in Leicester about action on November 30th



The General Secretary speaks about the action that PCS members will be taking on November 30th with hopefully up to twenty plus other unions who are currently balloting.

Please do not try to view this on an official PC.

Wednesday 12 October 2011

Monday 10 October 2011

Members asked to be part of a Branch Equality Forum

The Branch Executive Committee have created a Branch Equality Forum open to all members with the following remit:
Advise the BEC on policy issues relating to Black, disabled, women and gay, lesbian, bisexual and transgender members issues.
• To exchange information on developments in discussions with management and campaigns.
• To identify areas where local guidance is needed, and
• To consider and develop local strategies to increase the involvement and participation of members in the union.

The Forum will meet quarterly and our first meeting will be on Wednesday November 2nd in Conference Room 1 (floor 3) at New Walk Jobcentre. As facilities are unlikely for this meeting, it will commence at 17:15 for approximately one hour. The position on facilities will be reviewed before our next meeting in February.
If you are interested in matters of diversity and equality, please try to come along and make the forum inclusive and representative.
Notes from the forum will be published on the blog and in line with the terms of reference considered by the Branch Executive Committee.

Tony Church
Branch Vice-Chair

Friday 7 October 2011

Compulsory redundancies just got an awful lot closer

We've got the fight of our lives on our hands. One more reason for every PCS member (no excuses) to be out on November 30th. Redundancies for some, higher pension contributions for all. An inclusive leadership leading a united membership. We can win this!

Reckless and provocative' redundancy threat for benefits staff

6 October 2011

The threat of compulsory redundancy given to hundreds of benefits staff today is a "reckless and provocative" act.

The news, broken on the Department for Work and Pensions staff internet to those affected in benefits processing and call centres, means 350 people could be forced out of their jobs at a time of consistently high unemployment and on the brink of another expected recession.
The redundancies affect staff in 13 of the 22 centres earmarked for closure earlier this year, most of which are due to shut between now and May 2012.
It does not include staff in 20 closure-threatened jobcentres or those in other areas of the department, including staff in DWP headquarters offices, so many more redundancies are likely.
The union says the decision to announce a formal consultation on the job cuts - the first mandatory step towards making compulsorily redundancies - without discussing other options with staff and the unions is a clear breach of procedures agreed with the Cabinet Office.
It also goes against assurances senior managers gave employment minister Chris Grayling and the unions at a meeting last month, where they said all staff will be redeployed.
Affected staff in the centres were not informed in advance of today's intranet announcement, meaning they learned of their potential fate online.
With 2.5 million people out of work, and unemployment expected to rise throughout 2012, the job cuts will simply add to delays in processing claims.
At the same time, managers have revealed they are recruiting staff in other benefits processing centres to cope with demand. The union has pledged to fight every job cut and wants to ensure work is shared across the sites at risk.
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: "With unemployment high and expected to rise, it is reckless and provocative to cut hundreds of jobs in our benefits system, particularly when there are centres that can't cope and are recruiting new staff.
"Ministers should immediately withdraw this threat and send work to the sites at risk to ensure we have a properly resourced service to help people who are finding themselves out of work through no fault of their own."

Tuesday 4 October 2011

The Story of the Dirty 30

As part of the Everybody's Reading festival I & a number of other PCS members went to the above event featuring book readings & song.


The Dirty 30 were the Leicestershire miners who went on strike in 1984.

It is small consolation that they were right about the devastation of their industry & their communities but their story was truly inspiring.

The solidarity of other workers was there in 1984 & is still there today. We may need it in the struggles for justice that we have started on.

- Posted from my iPhone