Leeds Council Bulletin - AGM 2012 Special

NO MORE CUTS IN LEEDS CITY COUNCIL

Our employer is proposing to cut an estimated 55m from this years budget that could translate to up to 600 job losses. The 90m axed from last years budget is already having a detrimental impact to the services the Council delivers predominantly through its Early Leavers Initiative and even closures to some frontline services.

Leeds Unison
AGM dates & venues
Open to all members

Tuesday 20th March 2012, Workforce Change proposals 12.30 p.m., Leeds Art Gallery, was overwhelmingly rejected, Henry Moore and although there are new proposals regarding Managing Room, The Headrow, Leeds, Workforce Change our employer LS1 3AA still intends to reduce the time it has to redeploy staff and to Thursday 22nd March 2012, begin that time much earlier than 12.30 p.m., Belle Isle WMC we would like. Also, our employer has no intention of Tuesday 27th March 2012, implementing phase two of Pay & Grading re-evaluations and 4.30 p.m., Hough Top Court that there are groups of Up to now, the position of Unison members still awaiting appeal Thursday 29th March 2012, 5.15 p.m., UNISON Branch has been up to manage the cuts outcomes in phase 1. Office. so they impact least on our members, and although there It is plain to see that further cuts has been no compulsory w i l l s e e m o r e s e r v i c e s campaign is needed to prepare redundancies the imposition of threatened with closure. our members for action now. the ELI scheme and employment Cuts in our services have a This will see an increase in freeze has affected frontline detrimental effect to the social membership and put us in a services the most leaving many mobility of service users and strong position. As part of a services short staffed, making their families. Only those that campaign to defend our jobs and our members work harder. This can afford to will be able to services we must lobby our is particularly acute in both access the better quality services employer to stop and reverse the Childrens and Adults Social in the private sector. cuts by using its millions of Services. pounds it has in reserves to invest in jobs and services, and Defend Jobs & Services In our consultation ballot last In the first instance job cuts will as part of such a campaign, link year, the employers Managing affect trade union density which it to youth unemployment and will make it harder involve service users, parents for us to organise and carers in the widest possible to oppose them. way. Therefore it is necessary to build Unison must now build a a campaign now campaign for industrial action to to oppose all the defend jobs and services, call for c u t s a n d an all-stewards JTUC and generalise all the conduct an indicative ballot of issues we face the all members for industrial that has a action to oppose all the cuts detrimental effect within Leeds City Council. On the to jobs, pay and basis of a YES vote build for a Saturday joint trade union rally in conditions. conjunction with an industrial A joint trade union action ballot. Unison members lobby council meeting in February
Find out more: www.leedssocialistparty.wordpress.com / leedssp@hotmail.co.uk / Twitter: @leedssp

Leeds Council Bulletin - AGM 12

Pensions: HE Delegates Gagged

The Unison Higher Education sectional conference took place in Brighton on 2 March. Given that the government has launched a major attack on our pension schemes and following the massive strike on 30 November last year, you'd have thought that defending pensions would have been the key debate of the day. within the union in the last months, including by Dave Prentis himself in his union diary in the February 2012 edition of the union newsletter In Focus. This is clearly a spurious excuse and a slap in the face to union democracy. In reality the leaders of Unison have accepted the premise that we must pay more, work longer and get less when we retire, and are preparing to present a shoddy sell-out as some kind of achievement.

Join the Socialists!

The Socialist Party argues for more than just fighting the cuts. As long as capitalism exists working people will face a future of uncertainly. What we gain today, the bosses will try to take back tomorrow as they are doing with the NHS. We need an alternative way of running society, a socialist society, based on meeting the needs of the many by planning production in that direction rather than making profits for a few at the top. To do this we need to take the banks and the other monopolies that dominate our economy into public ownership and run them democratically. The Socialist Party is made up of ordinary people like you, so if you agree then join us in the struggle for socialism.

Instead, the Service Group Executive (SGE) announced that the emergency motions on pensions were ruled out because they included the term "heads of agreement" which they claimed did not exist and "therefore could not be acted The delegates did not take this lying on!" down, with a number of further attempts to get pensions discussed. In the end the When the spokesperson for the standing standing orders committee allowed a half orders committee was challenged to hour debate on pensions, but refused to explain the reason in more detail, he was allow a democratic vote on the motions. lost for words and said "he'd forgotten his notes". Delegates then voted unanimously for a living wage campaign and a pay claim The delegates voted virtually unanimously equal to inflation plus compensation for that they wanted the pension resolutions previous cuts. included. In response the chairperson suspended the conference, declaring that This blatant attempt to gag the rank and it would resume when delegates would file will not succeed, as anger builds up vote "the right way". over this and three years of pay cuts. The left is standing candidates for the SGE to We campaign for the following: After one and a half hours the conference challenge the current mis-leaders and Stop all cuts and closures. resumed with the SGE sticking to their will continue to campaign for a fighting Oppose compulsory guns, even though the term "heads of democratic union. redundancies and fight for agreement" has been used consistently

Workfare Protests Push Back Tories

Over the last month a wave of protests has hit companies involved with the government now discredited workfare schemes, which forced the unemployed to work for up to 30 hours a week for their dole.

Youth Fight for Jobs has led the protests in Leeds, including a Workfare Tour of Shame on March 3rd. The campaign has forced Tesco to pay its workers as well as seeing the government drop compulsion from one of its schemes. The struggle goes on to fight for decent This is tantamount to giving Tesco jobs with a living wage for all. and v ery profit ab le companies slave labour. A government report into the scheme revealed how workers in the store, who could only secure 16 hour contracts and were used to work extra hours to make ends meet, suddenly found that those shifts were no longer available. March 3rd Anti-Workfare Day of Action protest, Leeds

every job No to privatisation and the Public Finance Initiative (PFI). Bring all privatised council services back inhouse. Organise agency and parttime workers. No to a twotier workforce. Defend every service. Fight for the council to set a needs budget rather than doing Camerons dirty work for him. Trade unions to disaffiliate from New Labour, whose councillors are cutting council jobs and services in Leeds, and support candidates opposed to all cuts. Link up with service users, anti-cuts groups and community campaigns to defend all public services.

Find out more: www.leedssocialistparty.wordpress.com / leedssp@hotmail.co.uk / Twitter: @leedssp