As Christmas approaches, eleven workers at the Scottish Parliament face broken contracts and unemployment in the new year, courtesy of self-proclaimed champions of the Scottish working class, Tommy Sheridan and Rosemary Byrne.
Workers Clock
They are both MSPs, Sheridan being the only candidate for the Scottish Socialist Party elected when the parliament was founded in 1999, and Byrne one of five more who joined him after the second election in 2003.
Their party has been torn by a bitter dispute, centred around Sheridan's leadership, and a legal action he took against the News of the World when the paper made allegations about his private life. The rancour ended in Sheridan and Byrne's resignation from the SSP, and their founding of a new party called Solidarity.
This is recounted by way of background: the IWW has taken no side between these groups, and their members are clearly entitled to align themselves as they choose.
What they are not entitled to do, however, is make their parliamentary staff pay the price. The SSP group of six MSPs originally employed thirteen workers, promising them work until the next election in 2007 on wages paid from their pooled parliamentary allowances. Sheridan and Byrne have now withdrawn their support from this fund, and though two of the workers have switched employment to the new group, there is not enough money left to pay the remaining eleven for the rest of their contracts.
They are therefore placed in an impossible position: forced to choose between having their employment transferred to the new group against their will, and losing their jobs over a political split they did not precipitate. Meanwhile, Sheridan and Byrne now fund their parliamentary work with money taken straight from the pockets of the workers they themselves employed.
Five of the workers are members of the Industrial Workers of the World, while others are members of the National Union of Journalists, and though both unions have written to Sheridan and Byrne on these workers' behalf, so far neither have made any offer to honour their agreements.
The four remaining SSP MSPs - including Rosie Kane and Carolyn Leckie who are also members of the IWW - have expressed their full support for the workers whose future hangs in the balance, and are also attempting to intervene with Sheridan and Byrne, and the Scottish Parliament itself, which facilitated the withdrawal of payments: but so far equally without result.
The IWW has made it clear that it takes no interest in the political differences between the MSPs: but is demanding that it should not be resolved at the expense of the workers they collectively employed. This report has focused on Tommy Sheridan and Rosemary Byrne because these are the MSPs who are withholding payment. However, the workers' claim is against them all: and it is difficult to avoid the observation that any politician claiming to represent working people would do well to first treat their own workers fairly.
IWW Demands
The IWW Scottish Parliament Job Branch have therefore made the following demands of all six MSP's in the employing group:
» Retention of all 10 FTE jobs until the May 2007 Scottish Parliament elections
» NO redundancies
» NO pay cuts
» Acknowledgement of, and adherence to contractual obligations towards ALL staff employed by the original 6-member SSP Parliamentary Group
They ask all fellow workers to send messages of support for this struggle to:
Tommy Sheridan MSP:
tommy.Sheridan.msp@scottish.parliament.uk Rosemary Byrne MSP:
rosemary.byrne.msp@scottish.parliament.uk George Reid MSP (Presiding Officer of the Scottish Parliament):
presidingofficers@scottish.parliament.uk The postal address for all three is: Scottish Parliament, Holyrood, Edinburgh, EH99 1SP, United Kingdom.
Please copy the IWW Job Branch at barbara.scott @ scottish.parliament.uk
For further information please contact Barbara Scott at the above email address.
Comments
Hide the following 7 comments
Sheridan Versus the IWW
20.11.2006 07:57
My ex-Fellow Workers in the Industrial Workers of the World have put out an appeal for real workers' solidarity against the new Scottish political party "Solidarity Scottish so-called Socialist Movement" , led by Tommy Sheridan .
Having taken the cream- puff against the Scottish Socialist Party and formed his ego-party, Solidarity , Tommy no longer wishes to fund those full time workers he previously helped to employ . Parliamentary workers , some of whom are Wobblies , now face a cash and wages crisis which may lead to redundancies or pay-cuts .
"The IWW has made it clear that it takes no interest in the political differences between the MSP's : but is demanding that it should not be resolved at the expense of the workers collectively employed "
But the solution is not to punish the employees , effectively for their individual political beliefs , but to make them carry out their day-to-day staff duties for the new Solidarity SSM , in addition to the SSP .
In the past , there was a previous dispute involving the IWW members of the Scottish Parliament when SSP MSPs were suspended for what was deemed unparliamentary behaviour and forfeited staff allowances . The IWW laid the blame , not on who hired and fired i.e. their SSP employers who created the situation and endeavoured to pass on the penalty for defying the rules to their staff , but on the Scottish Parliament and the relevant committee .
For all the respect i have for the IWW , this latest dispute once again shows the difficulty in having IWW members working in full time paid positions for a political party that they themselves are faithful party members of .
A conflict of loyalty was inevitable at some time or other over some aspect of employment .
It appears (in these cases ) that the IWW has perhaps forgotten its rallying cry -
"The employers and the workers have no interests in common ."
ajohnstone
Homepage:
http://mailstrom.blogspot.com/2006/11/is-this-sheridans-solidarity.html
Sheridan Versus The IWW
20.11.2006 08:01
ajohnstone
Homepage:
http://mailstrom.blogspot.com/2006/11/is-this-sheridans-solidarity.html
Reply to A Johnstone
22.11.2006 16:40
Also do you believe that workers who work for political parties are not entitled to the same union solidarity as workers who work for capitalists? That we should be denied membership of unions? That we should be punished by association? If others agree with you then that really is a shame.
Barbara Scott
IWW Delegate - Scottish Parliament Job Branch
Barbara Scott
e-mail:
barbara@barbarascott.co.uk
yep
24.11.2006 16:06
best of luck with it all - only dimwits or capitalist apologists could be against the parliament workers' cause
sam
its typical to pass the blame
03.12.2006 21:37
whilst the witholding of money from the parliament doesnt help neither does the ssp spending approx 40k defending the right to have its minutes kept secret, and getting mccombes sent to jail, also might have helped the worker.
All we can see now is two left wing groups with two virtually identical programmes fucking over people employed by them cos of thier ego's.
Whats important here is not that the money is not there, its whats gonna be done about it. you can shout at each other and the gov all you want but its not gonna help get those workers paid. A plan needs to be hatched.
I may be wrong but i dont see any of the MSP's (ssp or the other lot) offering to hand over any of thier salaries to the workers. I dont see an appeal for funds from the respective partie members and thats the problem. I say damm the nationalist left and i will see you in the dole queue when they all get elected out next time
badger
two workers accept sheridan and byrnes offer
10.12.2006 00:36
The MSPs then offered comromises for two full time equivalent posts to be paid by them wihout any obligation to leave the SSP or join Solidarity.
The NUJ official who has been appointed to negotiate the dispute does not support the SSP claims that there dispute is with sheridan and byrne and has recommended that the workers accept a proposed compromise. To reject the proposals will almost certainly lead to redundancies.
At no time have all 11 jobs been at risk and despite the IWW claims there is not a possibility of eleven workers facing a christmas without wages or jobs.
Jim Monaghan
Solidarity's media relations officer being economical with the truth
15.12.2006 16:42
...and the employers are quite happy for them to do so and are treating it as a secondment.
[b]"The MSPs then offered comromises for two full time equivalent posts to be paid by them wihout any obligation to leave the SSP or join Solidarity."[/b]
Which is again true, however they were already employed and did not wish to leave their current employment or take up such a secondment.
[b]The NUJ official who has been appointed to negotiate the dispute does not support the SSP claims that there dispute is with sheridan and byrne and has recommended that the workers accept a proposed compromise. [/b]
The NUJ together with ourselves are unequivocally backing the parliamentary workers.
****************************
National Union of Journalists Statement
The SSP staff chapel at the Scottish Parliament has issued a deadline of
this Friday (1st December) for management officials and the two MSPs who
unilaterally withdrew from a collective agreement covering staff salaries to
offer an acceptable formula to make good on the financial shortfall which
has created the threat of redundancy for eleven NUJ members of the chapel.
Scottish National Organiser, Paul Holleran is seeking further information
from all sides in the dispute, but says he is making progress towards a
settlement.
This is in line with the call from the NUJ National Executive earlier
this month. The NEC wholeheartedly and solidly backed the chapel in their
fight to secure their jobs. It called on the National Organiser to negotiate
on behalf of the chapel with the two MSPs, Tommy Sheridan and Rosemary Byrne
and with the Parliamentary Corporate Body, with a view to securing a
settlement that lifts the threat of redundancy from the SSP staff.
Pete Murray
Scottish Representative
NUJ National Executive Council
*********************************
[b]To reject the proposals will almost certainly lead to redundancies. [/b]
Over the dead bodies of the IWW who are fighting to keep all jobs.
[b]At no time have all 11 jobs been at risk and despite the IWW claims there is not a possibility of eleven workers facing a christmas without wages or jobs. [/b]
The money from the remaining employers in the employing group runs out in February...so no there is no prospect of redundancies before Xmas, but 11 jobs will be lost in February through the unilateral withdrawal of £24K from the workers in the parliamentary group unless that money is replaced.
One Big Union
Glasgow Wob.
Glasgow Wob