Unions persist againgst council onslaught
Hackney Unison | 30.01.2002 01:11
Hackney Council workers and community representatives are organising to challenge the corrupt, incompetent and morally bankrupt east London authority.
After years of constant cuts, the authority plans further desperate cuts and a 10% hike in council tax to service a massive debt hangover. Libraries, nurseries, and home care provision are all under the axe.
Hackney Unison has been at the forefront of a campaign to prevent council cuts since the council entered financial free fall just over a year ago. The council eventually forced through cuts in pay and conditions by dismissing a thousand workers and offering them their jobs back on worse contracts. The Branch has also lodged over 350 Employment Tribunals over the attacks on terms and conditions.
In the middle of last year the council sacked the branch's joint chief negotiator, in August the Branch Chair and a senior steward were suspended, (all charges against them were later dropped after a sustained campaign). In November the Branch Secretary was threatened with dismissal after sending an email on the council server asking members to attend a lobby against cuts (again all charges have been dropped). A poster campaign and an accompanying advert in the local paper stated plainly 'Labour Councillors have you no shame'. The campaign eventually caused the Labour council to withdraw some of the worst and least lawful cuts, but they have all begun to re-appear as next years budget proves even less stable than those of previous years.
In January in a further attack on trade union organisation the employer effectively de-recognised the branch equalities officer and the senior health and safety rep.
However, the branch refuses to lie down and six days of branch wide strike action have been followed by nine weeks of Saturday strikes by library workers in response to the council's unilateral decision to withdraw their Saturday pay. A council 'compromise' of a short term re-instatement of Saturday pay was rejected at a mass meeting on Friday because workers had lost all trust in management, and because the compromise was to be funded through a re-organisation which would close yet another library. These workers are defending national terms and conditions, and the branch urgently needs support for its strike fund.
Hackney Unison has been at the forefront of a campaign to prevent council cuts since the council entered financial free fall just over a year ago. The council eventually forced through cuts in pay and conditions by dismissing a thousand workers and offering them their jobs back on worse contracts. The Branch has also lodged over 350 Employment Tribunals over the attacks on terms and conditions.
In the middle of last year the council sacked the branch's joint chief negotiator, in August the Branch Chair and a senior steward were suspended, (all charges against them were later dropped after a sustained campaign). In November the Branch Secretary was threatened with dismissal after sending an email on the council server asking members to attend a lobby against cuts (again all charges have been dropped). A poster campaign and an accompanying advert in the local paper stated plainly 'Labour Councillors have you no shame'. The campaign eventually caused the Labour council to withdraw some of the worst and least lawful cuts, but they have all begun to re-appear as next years budget proves even less stable than those of previous years.
In January in a further attack on trade union organisation the employer effectively de-recognised the branch equalities officer and the senior health and safety rep.
However, the branch refuses to lie down and six days of branch wide strike action have been followed by nine weeks of Saturday strikes by library workers in response to the council's unilateral decision to withdraw their Saturday pay. A council 'compromise' of a short term re-instatement of Saturday pay was rejected at a mass meeting on Friday because workers had lost all trust in management, and because the compromise was to be funded through a re-organisation which would close yet another library. These workers are defending national terms and conditions, and the branch urgently needs support for its strike fund.
Hackney Unison
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