Clarion Housing Group must raise pay and stop pension cuts to avoid strike action, says UNISON
Caretakers, sheltered housing wardens and other staff at Clarion Housing Group – the largest housing association in the country – have rejected a 5% pay offer, says UNISON today (Thursday).
The union says this is essentially a wage cut that falls well short of inflation and that employees deserve more.
Clarion also plans to cut the pensions of nearly 300 staff. The housing association has said it intends to close all its final salary schemes, which means employees will be significantly worse off, adds UNISON.
The union says Clarion is threatening to sack staff and re-employ them...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 20, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Fatima Ayad Tags: News Press release Source Type: news
UNISON urges pensions regulator to press for stronger data safety
UNISON has written to the pensions regulator to press for stronger protections to ensure that members’ pensions are safe, after outsourcing firm Capita experienced hacking attacks in March and May this year.
Among the data that has been compromised is information entrusted to Capita by some 450 pension schemes.
UNISON members are in some of the schemes and funds affected, including the Environment Agency Pension Fund (EAPF), Natural Resources Wales, the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS) and some local government pension funds. Capita has stated that its own pension scheme data has also been compromised, affecting...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 19, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Amanda Kendal Tags: Article News capita data protection pensions Source Type: news
Blog: The two-child limit is still cruel now and should be abolished
Last week, I spoke on the BBC’s Politics Live about the need for a proper debate on funding for public services in this country. Public services aren’t just the A&E services we use when something goes horribly wrong, they’re a part of our lives, every day, and that’s exactly how it should be.
A strong society relies on strong public services and a government that believes in building a supportive state. That state needs to give services the funds they need, pay the workforce fairly, and put an extra safety net in place for people when things go wrong in their lives.
It’s been 14 years since George Osborne...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 17, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Martin Cullen Tags: General Secretary's blog child benefit Christina McAnea Universal credit Source Type: news
UNISON condemns government plans to hike visa fees for migrants
UNISON has condemned the government’s plans to hike the fees charged to migrant people for visa applications.
The cost of the Immigration Health Surcharge – a double tax migrant workers have to pay to access healthcare – is set to increase from £624 to £1,035 a year for each person.
This is a 417% increase over the past five years. Work visas are set to increase by 15% and the cost of other visas could rise by 20%.
Prime Minister Rishi Sunak claims that this will fund public sector pay rises.
UNISON general secretary Christina McAnea said: “The government announcement to hugely increase the charges for migrant vi...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 17, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Janey Starling Tags: Article News hostile environment immigration migrant workers Source Type: news
Government must raise ‘ out-of-date ’ mileage rates for struggling public service staff, says UNISON
More than a million public service workers including care staff, district nurses, housing officers, police staff and probation officers are being left thousands of pounds out of pocket because ministers have failed to update national mileage rates, says a UNISON report published today (Friday).
NHS, social care, police and local government employees who need to drive for work are up to £6,000 a year worse off because the current 45p rate, set by HM Revenue and Customs, has not changed in over a decade, according to research by the union and the RAC Foundation.
The report Driven Out of Work says the allowa...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 13, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Fatima Ayad Tags: Article Christina McAnea mileage rates Source Type: news
UNISON launches next stage of One Team Us2 pay campaign
UNISON has launched a new stage in its One Team Us2 campaign to ensure that members working for private contractors in the NHS get the same pay as their colleagues who are directly employed.
The union’s health team and private contractors unit have identified key employers across England and have written to them, seeking full implementation of the NHS pay award and the unconsolidated one-off payment.
UNISON has asked for meetings with the “appropriate senior managers” at 18 employers to discuss the issue.
In the letter, Donna Rowe-Merriman, national secretary for business, community and environment, says: “UNISON...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 11, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Amanda Kendal Tags: Article News agenda for change NHS private contractors Put NHS pay right Put pay right Us2 Source Type: news
UNISON welcomes British standard on menopause support at work
UNISON has played a key role in the development of a new British standard on menstruation and menopause in the workplace, published today.
This new standard draws on UNISON’s guidance on menopause, designed to assist branches in ensuring that workplaces consider how menopausal symptoms can impact on women, trans and non-binary people.
UNISON national women’s officer Bukky Akinwale said: “The majority of our members are women who will experience the menopause. For many, it will be a natural occurrence, but for many others it can affect them profoundly, leading to emotional and health changes that can impact on t...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 5, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Janey Starling Tags: News equalities Menopause Source Type: news
Blog: From birth until death, the NHS is there for us all
For 75 years, everyone in the UK has depended on the care, skills, experience and dedication of millions of workers, spread across thousands of communities.
I’ve always said: ‘If it takes a village to raise a child, then it takes a whole team to care for a patient’.
NHS staff work as one team, every day, to provide the best care they can for everyone who needs it.
People from all around the world help to make up that team. And that started when RMS Windrush docked in Tilbury, Essex just a few weeks before the NHS was born.
On this 75th anniversary of our treasured health service, I’m reminded of just how mu...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 5, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Christina McAnea Tags: General Secretary General Secretary's blog Christina McAnea NHS 75 Source Type: news
Movement – keeping momentum going in HE strike ballot
UNISON is balloting members for strike action in targeted universities in England over the 2023/24 pay offer. The offer is worth between 5-8% depending on spinal column point.
This year UNISON has been using a new system, Movement, to increase engagement and turnout in ballots. It allows regions, branches and activists to use phone banking, peer to peer texting and to log feedback from members by email and from in-person conversations.
From these interactions, Movement records whether a member has voted, but not which way they have voted. For example, in the HE autumn term strike ballot Movement has logged that over 1,730 ...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 4, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Simon Jackson Tags: Article HE strike higher education Source Type: news
UNISON at 30 – celebrate good times, come on!
Thirty years ago this month, UNISON was born from the merger of three unions: Confederation of Health Service Employees (COHSE), National Union of Public Employees (NUPE) and National and Local Government Officers’ Association (NALGO).
Today UNISON is the biggest trade union in the UK with more than 1.253 million members, 75% of whom are women.
Numbers matter because numbers bring power – as we illustrated some years ago in our first TV advert. UNISON was the first trade union to advertise on TV – with the ants and the bears, which saw a bear ignoring one ant, and then two ants, before a whole crowd of ants make ...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - July 3, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Amanda Kendal Tags: Article News Croyde Bay legal services UNISON 30 Source Type: news
Blog: Matt Hancock made for grim listening at the COVID Inquiry
Matt Hancock, the man responsible for the health and care of the nation during the deadliest emergency for a century, finally gave his evidence to the COVID Inquiry this week. And it was just as grim as I’d expected.
He talked about social care like it was something he found down the back of his sofa, rather than a vital public service he was responsible for. At one point, he said: “We at the health department” – once again forgetting about social care.
He admitted he didn’t know how many care homes there were in the country when COVID hit, or how many care home residents lived in them. So how could he po...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - June 29, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Christina McAnea Tags: General Secretary's blog adult social care care homes Christina McAnea covid covid inquiry Source Type: news
Government must bring the water companies back to public ownership, says UNISON
Commenting on the near collapse of Thames Water and suggestions that ministers are considering bringing the company back under public ownership temporarily, UNISON head of environment Donna Rowe-Merriman said:
“The regulator has been asleep at the wheel. The owners of Thames Water have borrowed billions, yet downed every drop of profit, racked up gigantic debts and rewarded the poor performance of senior directors with huge salaries.
“Thames Water is meant to be delivering a vital public service. Instead, its reckless behaviour has led to regular sewage releases that pollute rivers, lakes and seas, kill wildlife, endan...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - June 29, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Fatima Ayad Tags: News Press release Donna Rowe-Merriman water Source Type: news
Soaring probation workloads put the public at risk, warn unions
Soaring workloads in the probation service are putting the public at risk, unions warn today (Monday).
Napo, UNISON and GMB, which represent staff working in the probation service in England and Wales, say crippling workloads will lead to a catastrophic breakdown of the service if the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) does not intervene.
Probation workers are responsible for monitoring people on probation in the community.
But a recent restructure and staff shortages are making it extremely difficult to keep tabs on some of the UK’s most dangerous individuals, say the unions.
Employees are buckling und...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - June 26, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Fatima Ayad Tags: News Press release ben priestley probation Source Type: news
Unmanageable probation workloads putting the public at risk, warn unions
Soaring workloads in the probation service are putting the public at risk, unions warn today (Monday).
Napo, UNISON and GMB, which represent staff working in the probation service in England and Wales, say crippling workloads will lead to a catastrophic breakdown of the service if the Ministry of Justice (MoJ) does not intervene.
Probation workers are responsible for monitoring people on probation in the community.
But a recent restructure and staff shortages are making it extremely difficult to keep tabs on some of the UK’s most dangerous individuals, say the unions.
Employees are buckling und...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - June 26, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Fatima Ayad Tags: News Press release ben priestley probation Source Type: news
UNISON raises the age limit for its young members
UNISON’s national delegate conference last week approved a rule change that has an immediate impact on the union’s young members.
Delegates agreed to raise the ceiling age for young member status from 26 to 30. This increases the time in which activists can work in a young member capacity and, consequently, the age of those taking the two young members’ seats on the national executive council.
It’s estimated that the move will roughly double the number of the union’s young members.
Josephine Grahl, UNISON’s national officer for young members, commented today: “We hope this change will strengthen UNISON’...
Source: UNISON meat hygiene - June 20, 2023 Category: Food Science Authors: Demetrios Matheou Tags: Article News 2023 National Delegate Conference NEC young members Source Type: news
