This is graphically shown when a protester at a local demo in Newcastle approached the council leader, and was later visited by the police and charged with a public order offence – for simply expressing his opinion against cuts in his city.
It is an outrage that any councillor can behave like the big bosses who use the law against trade unions, who challenge legal ballots to frustrate strike action; or who create new rules to deter victimised trade unionists from pursuing their cases through tribunals. Labour councillors are elected to protect workers’ services and to fight to keep jobs. If they can’t do this, and they won’t even attempt to do this, and worse, they start turning against the people who elected them with spurious legal charges, then what is the point of them? Trade unionists in many countries are drawing conclusions about their political representatives, and beginning to act. It is happening in Greece, now Italy and dramatically in South Africa. The NSSN condemns any councillor who attempts to use the law against protesters, and is willing to debate with any Labour councillor about how to defeat this Coalition through a united campaign of action by unions and community. (Linda Taaffee NSSN Sec)
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National Shop Stewards Network (NSSN) 7th national annual conference – 11am-5pm, Saturday June 29th, Camden Centre, Judd Street, London, WC1H 9JE – initial speakers confirmed: union general secretaries – Mark Serwotka PCS, Billy Hayes CWU and Steve Gillan POA
The entrance fee is £6. Cheques can be made payable to ‘National Shop Stewards Network’ reply to PO Box 54498, London E10 9DE. Email has been off since end of Jan, our apologies please contact Rob (Chair) or Linda (Sec) in the meantime.
Leaflet: & Letter for union branches, shop stewards committees, trades councils, anti-cuts campaigns
Union News
PCS
PCS national strike ballot is still on and finishes on March 4th and we encourage a YES/YES vote
‘Chaotic’ department denies 1,000 job cuts mean redundancies (Feb 21) – Lawyers for PCS are “totally mystified” by the Department for Education’s claim it is not making redundancies while shedding 1,000 jobs.
Goveaposs civil servants begin industrial action over 50 cuts
CWU
Ballot papers have been dispatched to almost 4,000 Crown Office staff in a dispute over pay and job security.
Unite
Unite secures pay, pensions deal to avert BP strike – See more Strike report: BP Tanker drivers at Grangemouth strike report (Feb 27) – BP tanker drivers from the Grangemouth oil refinery last week come out in a 72 hour strike action against cuts to pay and pensions. In a militant show of force workers from Unite are determined that they will not back down in a dispute against an obscenely rich company that regularly makes around £1 billion profit per month. The attacks on pensions see some workers threatened with losses of up to £13 000 per year and most workers are also faced with current cuts of £1400 per year to their pay.
Pilkington glass attempts to bully staff out of pensions – (Feb 27)Unite has warned the owners of Pilkington Glass that its staff are ready to take strike action over attempts to bully and intimidate them out of their hard earned pensions
‘Divisive’ performance pay in the NHS will be resisted warns Unite (Feb 26) Unite pledged to fight the imposition of changes to Agenda for Change at today’s (Tuesday, 26 February) NHS Staff Council meeting, which will slash the pay and conditions of more than one million NHS staff in England and introduce divisive performance related pay. Yorkshire ambulance workers are looking to ballot over the introduction of assistants.
Victory for Greencore workers in Hull (Feb 24) – Thanks to all of you who sent messages of support and solidarity to Greencore in their recent fightback against the disgraceful behaviour of management at the Hull site. There was solid support for their strike on 30th January and following a failure to negotiate a fair settlement, commitment to a further 24 hour strike from tomorrow. As a result, management caved in last week and agreed to 100% of our claim as well as agreeing to negotiate on other issues that hadn’t formed part of the dispute. Our membership has now increased from less than 300 when the campaign started to in excess of 500 now and still growing, proving yet again that when we fight back workers join our union
London Overground workers prepare to vote on strike action (Feb 22) – The London Overground faces the very real possibility of severe disruption to services as workers maintaining the trains prepare to vote on strike action. 39 engineers employed by Bombardier UK are furious over changes to their shift patterns which will mean extra travel and more disruption to their home and family lives. Bombardier wants to impose new shifts on the workers on 4 March, but has not listened to Unite’s concerns about the impact the new shifts will have on workers
Construction workers demand adherence to agreements (Feb 20) – Over 100 construction workers from across Cheshire and Merseyside protested at the Capenhurst site near Ellesmere Port today, against the employers’ threat to national agreements STOP PRESS: over 100 workers protested at the site again!
RMT
RMT security and safety staff employed by STM Security Group on London Overground services will be taking strike action today Thursday March 28 in a dispute over bullying and harassment and an attempt to impose workplace changes without agreement. They’re protesting today between 9am-11am outside TFL HQ – Windsor House, 42-50 Victoria Street, London SW1H 0TL
FBU
Fire Brigades Union says “It’s Boris Johnson versus the rest of London”, as cuts battle gets under way (Feb 26) – The Fire Brigades Union (FBU) has vowed to mobilise every firefighter at every fire station to defend London’s fire service, after fire authority politicians decided to comply with an order by the mayor of London, Boris Johnson, for public consultation to begin on proposals to close 12 fire stations, remove 18 engines and slash 520 frontline firefighter posts
Families of firefighters killed in Sussex take their battle for compensation to the courts (Feb 22) – Six years after two firefighters were killed in a fireworks explosion at Marlie Farm near Lewes in Sussex; their families’ long fight for compensation reaches the High Court next week
GMB
GMB against cuts to terms & conditions for staff in the NHS (Feb 26) – the NHS is exposed to the market and Section 75 of the Health & Social Care Act and cuts to terms and conditions of NHS Staff pose real threats to destroying a National Health Service says GMB
NUJ
BBC unions ballot for strike action over job cuts, workload and bullying (Feb 26) – BBC workers are to be balloted for strike action over compulsory redundancies, workload, stress and bullying and harassment – all a result of the corporation’s cost-cutting programme, Delivering Quality First (DQF). The NUJ is re-balloting for action, this time with BECTU and Unite, following its successful strike last week which pulled a range of flagship programmes off the air. The ballot closes at midday 20 March and could lead to disruption of the Easter TV and radio schedule
EIS
College Lecturers Strike over pay in Scotland.
NASUWT
NASUWT begin 5 –day special needs strike.
UNISON
Mid Yorks battle may esculate with a possible call for strike action of all 3,000 members of the NHS trust over huge pay cuts or loosing their jobs.
80% of local government workers struggling with stress
UCU
Birmingham UCU vote for action over performance management & redundancies.
CLEANERS BRANCH
Please come and support the cleaners employed by the multinational cleaning contractor ISS at Capgemini, next to Vauxhall station on Wed 6th March at 3pm. The cleaners are saying: NO TO REDUNDANCIES! NO TO RACISM! NO TO POVERTY WAGES! YES TO A LIVING WAGE! Bring pots, pans, placards, friends and family. 95 Wandsworth Road London SW8 2HG London, Vauxhall March 6th 3pm.
OTHER NEWS
Birmingham: a bitter fight against austerity measures.
Closing the ILF ““You get a choice now between neglect at home, or residential care abuse.”
The Wealth Gap in London report from the Greater London Authority
New TUC bulletin on Health & Safety Inspections
You know we haven’t given up in fighting for a general strike and we will report on the TUC meeting very soon and our strategies meantime, we thought it worth alerting you to WORK YOUR PROPER HOURS DAY which is on Friday 1st March. As a minimum, work your proper hours, we give away or are coerced into doing more than we should. Maybe have meeting, have a good lunch, work out a plan to resist the austerity onslaught and have a think (OMG time to think?!) what you might do with MORE TIME.
Blacklisting & Victimisation
Blacklisted worker wins human rights argument (Feb 27) – A blacklisted worker who was denied justice because he was an agency worker has been told his human rights may have been violated and has been granted leave to appeal. An Employment Appeals Tribunal (EAT) this week decided that construction giant Carillion must face human rights claims over its role in the construction industry blacklisting scandal. Justice Singh ordered that a High Court judge should hear Dave Smith’s EAT case
Electricians top trade on construction industry blacklist as GMB shows breakdown by occupation (Feb 26) – Carillion in court in London today for blacklisting Essex construction worker who seeks remedy for harm he suffered at their hands. GMB, the union for construction workers, has disclosed the breakdown by occupation of workers on construction industry blacklist. This covers 1,864 (58%) where the occupation is known for the total of 3,213 on the blacklist
Crossrail contractor faces legal claim for blacklisting (Feb 26) – Unite is supporting Frank Morris, a construction worker sacked from the Crossrail project. Unite believes he is the victim of a blacklisting conspiracy by the construction consortium Bam Ferrovial Kier (BFK)
STOP THE WITCH HUNT – DEFEND JAWAD, Max & Steve UCU reps & Mmebers. Public meeting 6.20pm Resource for London, 356 Holloway Rd, N7 [email protected] & Uniso
Shrewsbury Pickets – Please sign and circulate Ricky Tomlinson’s e-petition. The Deadline: 27th June 2013. The Justice Secretary, Chris Grayling, has recently announced that crucial Government documents relating to the Shrewsbury pickets’ trials in 1973 are to be kept locked away for a further 10 years – 50 years after the dispute took place. Please sign the e-petition to ensure that the documents are released whilst the pickets are alive
International
India – over 100 million stop work in 48-hour general strike (Feb 26) – The 48 hour general strike called by the Joint Committee of Trade Unions (JCTU), comprising of 11 Central Trade Unions, once again saw massive participation of the working class. On 20 and 21st February, over 100 million workers all over India participated to say ’No’ to neo-liberal reforms
Turkey – More than 100 public sector unionists arrested – Police raids have targeted members and leaders of public sector union KESK in the early morning of Tuesday 19 February. This new attack against the Turkish trade union movement, carried out by the authorities in 28 cities across the country, resulted in the arrest of at least 100 unionists, including many members of teachers’ union Egitim Sen
Egypt Thousands block railroad lines to Cairo over rising oil prices.
Ireland – Protests and pay talks show growing anger (Feb 25) – Four unions walk out of talks on public sector pay deal – for a new alliance of fighting unions!
Jordon – Nurses strike March 25th
Diary
FEBRUARY
28 Stand up for social housing, One Vision office Bootle 11.30
Cardiff stop the council cuts 3.30pm City Hall.
MARCH
Spirit of 45 Ken Loach’s film on the battle for the NHS will be out in cinemas across the UK.
1 WORK YOUR HOURS DAY. Today & Every day! We gave the employer £29.2 billion of FREE work in 2011.
12.30 Sheffield Town Hall lobby council over another possible £50 million of cuts!
5 House of Lords protest 1.30pm College green over NHS commissioning done through ‘competative markets’
6 Liverpool city council budget day protest against cuts 4pm
BASSA protest in support of IBEERIA colleagues in Spain. 1pm Unite House, UB3 5BQ
7 Brighton No to cuts & Austerity Defend the NHS. 7pm Friends Mtg House
8 International Women’s Day
St Albans, Welwyn & Hatfield trades council presents Banner Theatre “Fighting the Cuts” in St Albans 7.30pm. Admission free, bar and refreshments available. Contact Jon Berry [email protected] or 07721 040 631
Ealing Trades Council IWD short film ‘A womans worth’ and music [email protected]
No laughing matter! Comedy night for rape is no joke. Canal theatre, London 7pm
9 Dundee protest against blacklisting 10.30 Meadowside.
Southampton rap & rock against Soton youth service cuts. All day benefit @ the Joiners
13 VISTEON 4th Anniversary Demonstration meeting at London Unite HQ at 10.45am and then to Westminster for rally and speeches
EUROPEAN DAY OF ACTION – NSSN SUPPORT THIS EUROPE WIDE CALL OF ACTION AGAINST CUTS & BOGUS AUSTERITY FOR US and action on that day. TUC Pre-Budget Rally: A Future for Families London: Wednesday 13 March 2013 starting at 18:00
The Emmanuel Centre, 9-23 Marsham Street, London SW1P 3DW Book: TUC website
15 Newcross Fire station public meeting 7.30pm Barnes Wallis Centre, SE14 5L
16 RESISTING AUSTERITY in Europe and in the UK conference organised by SERTUC 10.00 am –16.00 pm, Congress House, WC1 3LS. Key discussions on: International crisis, International resistance/Austerity in Britain, there IS an alternative & how trade unions can fight austerity. Book your place on 020 7467 1218 or email [email protected]
Councillors against cuts conference supported by LRC. 11am Birmingham.
Save Whittington Hospital demonstration – assemble 11.30am Highbury Corner, Holloway Road, London N7
Defend Clapham Fire Station demonstration – assemble on The Common 12noon rear of Holy Trinity Church SW4 0QZ
23 Campaign for Trade Union Freedom launch rally 1.30-4.30pm Friends Meeting House London. With Len McCluskey Unite, Bob Crow RMT, Billy Hayes CWU. here
Blacklist Support Group AGM 10.30-4pm Faraday house, 48 Old Gloucester St, London WC1N
Barnet Spring march over sell offs of services. 1pm Finchley station
27 ACTION for Rail day of action [email protected]
APRIL
29 Unite exhibition to celebrate election of Liverpool 47, who fought would not implement Tory cuts and built 5000 houses, is opened by Len Mcluskey Unite, Tony Mulhern & more!
MAY
1 International Workers day!
2 ‘The Thatcher years’ month long exhibition of response to the last Tory government at Richmix by Dave Sinclair and related events including ‘Don’t mention the 47’ documentary on Sunday 12th May. Donate to the project using crowdfunder or via your union branch/Trades council or groups.
JUNE
29 June 7th annual conference of the NSSN
11am-5pm Camden Centre, Judd Street, London, WC1H 9JE
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FACEBOOK STOP THE CUTS or NSSN Group
NSSN, PO Box 54498, London E10 9DE
Secretary: Linda Taaffe
Email: [email protected]
Phone: 07952 283 558
SORRY OUR EMAIL IS STILL NOT FUNCTIONING. Email Linda or Rob directly for now. Thanks
