Today (28th Sept) Kev Allsop, Secretary of Bolton Trades Council, took a message of support to the striking UNITE members who are entering their 17th week of industrial action.
Dispute
21 Unite members working at the E Lancs NHS trust are still owed back pay after the trust management failed to fully honour made in 2019 to move workers from pay band 5 to band 6. The uplift was agreed but the members agreed that it could be put on hold whilst they focused their attention on the Pandemic and the workforce believe that the employers failure to act is an example of Bad Faith and they must therefore continue with Industrial Action.
General Secretary Visit
The Picket line was today visited by the UNITE General Secretary, Sharon Graham who promised continued support from the union.
Show your support
After 17 weeks of strike pay and winter fast approaching we ask that Trade Union branches, CLP’s and concerned individuals send any and all support possible to the strikers.
Modibo Sall, 10, teaches sign language to his father Amadou, 52-year-old. Modibo was born deaf. He lives in the village of Bouaké, in the center of Côte d’Ivoire. Photo:UNICEF/Frank Dejongh
Theme 2020: Building Back Better: toward a disability-inclusive, accessible and sustainable post COVID-19 World
Disability inclusion is an essential condition to upholding human rights, sustainable development, and peace and security. It is also central to the promise of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development to leave no one behind. The commitment to realizing the rights of persons with disabilities is not only a matter of justice; it is an investment in a common future.
The global crisis of COVID-19 is deepening pre-existing inequalities, exposing the extent of exclusion and highlighting that work on disability inclusion is imperative. People with disabilities—one billion people— are one of the most excluded groups in our society and are among the hardest hit in this crisis in terms of fatalities.
Even under normal circumstances, persons with disabilities are less likely to access health care, education, employment and to participate in the community. An integrated approach is required to ensure that persons with disabilities are not left behind.
Disability inclusion will result in a COVID19 response and recovery that better serves everyone, more fully suppressing the virus, as well as building back better. It will provide for more agile systems capable of responding to complex situations, reaching the furthest behind first.
History
The annual observance of the International Day of Disabled Persons was proclaimed in 1992 by United Nations General Assembly resolution 47/3. It aims to promote the rights and well-being of persons with disabilities in all spheres of society and development, and to increase awareness of the situation of persons with disabilities in every aspect of political, social, economic and cultural life.
When launching the United Nations Disability Inclusion Strategy in June 2019, the Secretary-General stated that the United Nations should lead by example and raise the Organization’s standards and performance on disability inclusion—across all pillars of work, from headquarters to the field.
The United Nations Disability Inclusion Strategy provides the foundation for sustainable and transformative progress on disability inclusion through all pillars of the work of the United Nations. Through the Strategy, the United Nations system reaffirms that the full and complete realization of the human rights of all persons with disabilities is an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of all human rights and fundamental freedoms.
Theme 2020: Building Back Better: toward a disability-inclusive, accessible and sustainable post COVID-19 World
Disability inclusion is an essential condition to upholding human rights, sustainable development, and peace and security. It is also central to the promise of the 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development to leave no one behind. The commitment to realizing the rights of persons with disabilities is not only a matter of justice; it is an investment in a common future.
The global crisis of COVID-19 is deepening pre-existing inequalities, exposing the extent of exclusion and highlighting that work on disability inclusion is imperative. People with disabilities—one billion people— are one of the most excluded groups in our society and are among the hardest hit in this crisis in terms of fatalities.
Even under normal circumstances, persons with disabilities are less likely to access health care, education, employment and to participate in the community. An integrated approach is required to ensure that persons with disabilities are not left behind.
Disability inclusion will result in a COVID19 response and recovery that better serves everyone, more fully suppressing the virus, as well as building back better. It will provide for more agile systems capable of responding to complex situations, reaching the furthest behind first.
History
The annual observance of the International Day of Disabled Persons was proclaimed in 1992 by United Nations General Assembly resolution 47/3. It aims to promote the rights and well-being of persons with disabilities in all spheres of society and development, and to increase awareness of the situation of persons with disabilities in every aspect of political, social, economic and cultural life.
When launching the United Nations Disability Inclusion Strategy in June 2019, the Secretary-General stated that the United Nations should lead by example and raise the Organization’s standards and performance on disability inclusion—across all pillars of work, from headquarters to the field.
The United Nations Disability Inclusion Strategy provides the foundation for sustainable and transformative progress on disability inclusion through all pillars of the work of the United Nations. Through the Strategy, the United Nations system reaffirms that the full and complete realization of the human rights of all persons with disabilities is an inalienable, integral and indivisible part of all human rights and fundamental freedoms.
In recognition of this commitment, the Secretary-General submitted in October 2020, the first comprehensive report on steps taken by the United Nations system to mainstream disability inclusion and implement the Strategy since its launch.
Slavery is not merely a historical relic. According to the International Labour Organisation (ILO) more than 40 million people worldwide are victims of modern slavery. Although modern slavery is not defined in law, it is used as an umbrella term covering practices such as forced labour, debt bondage, forced marriage, and human trafficking. Essentially, it refers to situations of exploitation that a person cannot refuse or leave because of threats, violence, coercion, deception, and/or abuse of power.
In addition, more than 150 million children are subject to child labour, accounting for almost one in ten children around the world.
Facts and figures:
An estimated 40.3 million people are in modern slavery, including 24.9 in forced labour and 15.4 million in forced marriage.
There are 5.4 victims of modern slavery for every 1,000 people in the world.
1 in 4 victims of modern slavery are children.
Out of the 24.9 million people trapped in forced labour, 16 million people are exploited in the private sector such as domestic work, construction or agriculture; 4.8 million people in forced sexual exploitation, and 4 million people in forced labour imposed by state authorities.
Women and girls are disproportionately affected by forced labour, accounting for 99% of victims in the commercial sex industry, and 58% in other sectors.
In 1977, the General Assembly called for the annual observance of 29 November as the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People (resolution 32/40 B). On that day, in 1947, the Assembly adopted the resolution on the partition of Palestine (resolution 181 (II))
In resolution 60/37 of 1 December 2005, the Assembly requested the Committee on the Exercise of the Inalienable Rights of the Palestinian People and the Division for Palestinian Rights, as part of the observance of the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People on 29 November, to continue to organize an annual exhibit on Palestinian rights or a cultural event in cooperation with the Permanent Observer Mission of Palestine to the UN.
The resolution on the observance of the International Day of Solidarity with the Palestinian People also encourages Member States to continue to give the widest support and publicity to the observance of the Day of Solidarity.
It is widely reported that the chancellor, Rishi Sunak, intends to impose a pay cap on most public sector workers. Sunak is expected to usher in a new era of public sector pay restraint as he is faced with a deficit that is on course to hit a peacetime record in 2021. We should view this move as the attack upon those for what it is, an attempt to weaken and undermine organised labour and pay restraint for all but frontline NHS staff an attempt to divide workers and avoid public outcry.
Unions reacted angrily to the prospect of a wage freeze, Mark Serwotka, general secretary of the Public and Commercial Services union, said: “Civil servants along with millions of other public sector workers have kept the country running throughout this pandemic, and the last thing they deserve is another pay freeze.”
A new report by the Centre for Policy Studies (CPS) said private sector workers had suffered far more from the economic impact of the disease. The centre-right think tank said measures were needed to ensure the labour market was not unfairly weighted towards the public sector.
Ive no doubt that the chancellor will attempt to use the Pandemic as an excuse for Austerity 2 but this is the wrong approach and yet again the conservatives appear to fail to understand lessons from Austerity 1.
Stifling wages below inflation should never be accepted. Instead we should set out a program that will see a return to 2008/10 levels of pay over the short term. With a minimum of inflation+ thereafter
There is a very good reason why Neo Liberals like Austerity as since austerity 1 public sector employees, who he proposes to further restrain, have seen their wages fall in real terms by 20% whilst the richest have seen their collective wealth grow by hundreds of billions of pounds
Alfie Stirling wrote for Left Foot Forward about NEF analysis showing the true economic impact of austerity:
“The calculations make for grim reading. The isolated impact of government policy has reduced GDP growth every single year since 2010.
After compounding this effect year-on-year, the effects of austerity are expected to have suppressed the level of GDP by almost £100 billion in the 2018/19 alone.
To break this number down another way, it means that deliberate policy from government over the past nine years has had the standalone effect of suppressing incomes and expenditure in the economy by just under £1,500 per person and more than £3,600 per household, in this year alone.”
Our call must be to borrow more, employ more and spend more to drive the economy as it has never been so cheap for the government to borrow money and the government should take full advantage of the markets to issue bonds that can be paid back over decades or even centuries, we recently learned that Britain used 40% of its national budget to buy freedom for all slaves and the monies were only paid off in 2014, 181 years later.
Wage restraints will have a negative effect upon the economy and for the current economic model to survive we need money to enter and move about the local economy. When we get paid properly we buy more and thus more people are employed to service that buying.
What we need to drive the economy is large scale spending, and spending on activity where the main cost is wages to a directly employed workforce which is why large infrastructure projects are often the key as, they cannot be shipped in, or outsourced to other countries but are done by people living in the local area with PAYE going back to the treasury and their pensions invested in infrastructure and reducing the future dependency upon the public purse.
The government should invest extensively on labour intensive works such as
Solar and wind farms from manufacture to installation
Insulating homes from manufacture to installation, with a means tested contribution from the householder which would replace the flaw in the current scheme which only supports those who can afford a significant contribution.
“In cash terms, we have the highest government debt we have ever had.
But the cost is exceptionally low, and even if we increase what is described as borrowing as a consequence of coronavirus the impact will still be very small given current, exceptionally low interest rates, which look like they will persist for a very long time.
Please do always recall, that every penny the government spends on interest becomes someone’s income – and most of it in the UK. And there is good reason for that: UK national debt is just a savings mechanism.
There is nothing more menacing or threatening about it to our wellbeing than the amount saved in banks and building societies.”
In a sudden sharp reversal of policy, the UK government has announced a second lockdown across England.
This on-off approach, without fixing the testing system or protecting people’s livelihoods, reveals a complete lack of a coherent UK strategy to eliminate the virus which obstructs devolved governments pursuing better policies.
By ignoring calls for an earlier circuit breaker from the government’s own scientific advisory body SAGE, Independent SAGE, trade unions, the Hazards workplace safety campaign, and the Labour Party, the government’s delay will lead to many more infections, hospitalisations, deaths, long term disabilities and lost livelihoods.
This Trades Union Council BELIEVES
That there is a simple alternative to this chaotic policy of ‘living with the virus’, with its on-off lockdowns, ineffectual testing programme and constant economic insecurity.
The alternative is the strategy currently in place in Australia, China, New Zealand, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan and Vietnam, who have almost entirely eliminated the virus and whose citizens enjoy life without the need for draconian lockdown restrictions.
This means full lockdown and safe working conditions in essential workplaces until community transmission is near to zero, then suppression of small outbreaks via local public sector Find, Test, Trace, Isolate and Support, and 100% protection of livelihoods.
This is the ZERO COVID strategy recommended by Independent SAGE, Hazards and others, which offers a way forward to a UK with minimal Covid infection, injury, death and pandemic-related economic disruption.
This Trades Union Council RESOLVES
To campaign for the UK-wide implementation of a ZERO COVID strategy
To affiliate to the ZERO COVID campaign
To make a donation of £…. To the ZERO COVID campaign
To invite a speaker from the campaign to our next meeting
To encourage members to participate in the ZERO COVID campaign
To send this motion on to appropriate bodies (GMATUC, NW TUC, etc)
The ZERO COVID launch statement and affiliation form are appended to this motion.Further information is available from www.zerocovid.uk.
The Covid-19 pandemic is the latest crisis to expose western economic and social orthodoxies as wholly inadequate for meeting modern global challenges which also include climate change, poverty, war and the mass displacement of people. In the UK, massive state intervention has been necessary, not least to ameliorate some of the effects of 40 years of austerity which intensified following the 2008 global financial crash. Our population has been exposed, not just to a deadly virus, but also to the importance of key – previously undervalued – workers (producers) and the impotence of markets.
The government’s initial laissez-fair response which sought to develop a Darwinian “herd immunity” has been forced to evolve quickly, take heed of progressive voices such as the TUC and now includes measures to underwrite the incomes of tens of millions of people – not out of benevolence but in order to maintain consumer demand and the stability of financial institutions in the short-term.
When organs of monopoly capital such as the Financial Times[1] begin speculating about a post-pandemic economy requiring “radical reform” in which “public services [are] investments rather than liabilities…[when we must] look for ways to make labour markets less insecure” and “redistribution” is necessary, it becomes obvious that conditions are ripe for fundamental change. Things probably will never be the same again but our movement needs to be clear that minor reforms do not represent the sum total of our ambitions – even if, in the early days of an anticipated backlash or intensified class conflict, they appear to represent a welcome alternative to the default prospect of a period of much longer and much harsher austerity.
Aims for a post-pandemic consensus
Many workplaces, from hospitals to warehouses, supermarkets to schools and mail depots to care homes are unable any longer to be managed through a system of strict command and control. Workplace pluralism has broken out and is now recognised as necessary to optimise organisational efficiency and safety which is essential for the effectiveness of the public response to a national crisis and represents an opportunity for a renaissance of trade union activity.
Taking the existing provisions of the TUC Campaign Plan, Charter for a new deal for working people and considering the spirit behind the motions submitted to the postponed 2020 Annual Conference of the TUC North West, the Executive Group has considered the appropriate immediate tasks. These assume that the TUC and affiliated unions will form a functional part of the interventions required from civic society if we are to emerge from the Covid-19 pandemic with a renewed relevance and appetite to deliver progress for the people we represent:
A stronger voice at work
The producers in the economy have assumed a new significance and found renewed respect throughout the public health crisis. Medical and social care professions, shop and distribution workers, engineers and other workers in the fields of education, communications, sanitation and transport; public sector employees engaged in welfare, justice, housing, social work and beyond; and thousands of other jobs and vocations which were previously undervalued at best or exploited, and even demonised at worst, but are now held in higher regard by society at large. Their workplace voice is being heard more clearly and with more confidence than at any time since the peak of collective bargaining influence in the mid-1970s with examples including the demands for personal protective equipment in hospitals, the practical and academic arrangements for schools to remain open for those who need them but closed for the majority of students and the social distancing regimes which are now routine in factories, depots, warehouses and shops.
Going forward, a recalibrated industrial balance tipped in our favour is essential; backed up with a range of new and legally enforceable, collective workplace rights to secure effective mechanisms for regulating relations between workers and employers of any size. International Labour Organisation conventions and publications such as the Institute of Employment Rights’ Guide to a Progressive Industrial Relations Bill provide a template for such an initiative to be progressed by the TUC and supportive organisations, consistent with existing policy and in conjunction with affiliates.
Employment, security and flexible working
The lockdown announced on 23 March has exposed a range of inefficiencies in traditional ways of working and forced a reconsideration of how technology can assist workers rather than be used to replace them. Video conferencing and digital communications have become commonplace and have replaced physical meetings – saving time, stress and significant levels of pollution from unnecessary travel on congested transport networks.
The process of “furloughing” (Job Retention Scheme), introduced in no small part as a product of TUC lobbying, challenges a whole plethora of assumptions about the role of the state and its relationship with industry, incomes policy, the markets and maintenance of some sort of temporary order in the wider economy. Moreover, the scandal of precarious employment, bogus self-employment and casualisation more generally, now needs to force a fundamental re-think about job security – not least because as many as 11 million workers are expected to fall between the gaps in the government’s emergency provisions.
Globalisation and global markets have proven unable to provide an adequate response to the crisis, as exemplified by the absence of a domestic manufacturing sector capable of responding as quickly and effectively as required, for example, to produce medical ventilators, clinical gowns, masks and other types of PPE. With UK business investment[2] and productivity[3] continuing to decline and global debt to GDP at historic levels[4], the recovery from the crisis requires significant state intervention, specifically in respect of long-term domestic industrial development, research, skills and job creation, including new Green Jobs, towards a policy of full employment.
Flexible working and home-working have proven effective in ways that employers might not have previously thought possible and, with a few exceptions, unions have been able to secure pragmatic agreements on the use of discipline, capability, performance management, redundancy consultation and other Human Resource Management initiatives during the crisis. This reorientation needs to be secured after the crisis subsides with a transformation of management techniques and practices which are leveraged by confident workers with a better understanding of industrial relations.
Welfare, tax and public services
The fragility of social care provision has been brought into even sharper focus throughout the crisis – not least in respect of the lack of coordination around the provision of Personal Protective Equipment for an enormously undervalued group of professional Carers. Though just one example of the failure of market provision, this can provide the basis for a popular campaign of nationalisation and insourcing of a wide range services which have been removed from democratic control since the post-war consensus made way for neo-liberalism in the 1970’s but which have been demonstrated to be essential for societies to thrive and in reducing inequality.
This requires a new way of thinking about who contributes to society and how those contributions are valued. Hedge-fund managers and financiers were nowhere near the top of the list of “key workers” as identified by the government[5] but to ensure that all citizens and corporations meet their social responsibility obligations it is necessary to re-evaluate how taxes on high salaries, profits and accumulated assets can contribute to a transformational programme of societal and economic reform. Such a programme does of course require sufficient numbers of trained staff to collect tax owed and circumvent domestic and international loopholes which currently allow and facilitate large-scale tax avoidance and evasion.
Reforms of the type described can provide a solid basis for root-and-branch social security reform in the interests of families; sick, disabled or retired workers and the professional staff who care for them.
Safe, satisfying and dignified work
Many workplaces have looked and felt different during the crisis with workers organising themselves to take control of social distancing matters and assert rights to other protective measures including access to equipment. This needs to be maintained and would be assisted by the introduction of new and enhanced health and safety legislation, under a reinvigorated Health and Safety Executive with strong worker representation, which goes beyond the protections offered by the European Union and provides recognised safety reps with additional powers to control the management of risks.
Alienation is a phenomenon that has long since afflicted a range of workers and this becomes more problematic with the advent of “lean” processing, excessive monitoring and intrusive surveillance made possible by exploitative bosses’ misuse of new technologies allied with management practices which have persisted since the industrial revolution. Enhanced workplace democracy allied with investments in life-long learning, skills, training and development can provide for more rewarding careers, higher levels of job satisfaction and a better work/life balance based on a shorter working week and better holiday provision.
One of the positives to emerge from the crisis is a new sense of solidarity that is evident among workers. This needs to be grasped as a new opportunity to build sustainable links within and between communities – and between nations – which helps us to root out racism, sexism, homophobia and any other prejudice which might otherwise be in danger of being exploited by the far-right.
Building class unity and winning a new deal for working people
Our unions already contribute to joint campaigns on issues such as health, education, welfare and transport, and Trades Councils provide the vital link between the workplace and the wider working-class community including service users. Many of our affiliated unions will maintain a direct link through the political levy with the Labour Party and actively participate within it. However, for the remainder of the pandemic and in its immediate aftermath, communities will rightly expect a new social settlement which is designed, planned, implemented and monitored in a manner which promotes maximum democratic participation and sustainability at local community level. This will not prejudice our international solidarity work; indeed, the opposite is true as an effective response to a domestic, post-pandemic class conflict will provide a range of opportunities to contribute to global campaigns for justice and genuine expressions of internationalism.
Economists have estimated that UK private enterprises will require a £350bn bailout in the period following the crisis and the working-class will need to prepare for a significant battle if we are to avoid being left to pick up the bill in a similar fashion to that which followed the global banking crisis of 2008. If left unopposed, working people will have job losses, pay cuts and evictions to look forward to while the public services that remain, albeit wounded, from the last attack will be further undermined. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Our working class institutions and the people who make them up have demonstrated their legitimacy and ability in running civic institutions and productive enterprises on new and better terms when transmission rates of the virus eventually subside and we emerge in to the post-pandemic period with a new outlook on society and our individual and collective roles within in it.
Conclusion and recommendations
There can be no going back to pre-pandemic societal and economic conditions. The TUC will need to make a crucial contribution to popularising the principals and demands set out above as part of a broad coalition which includes individual affiliates, civic society and progressive community-based organisations.
We will work to ensure that the TUC:
Reaches out at regional and local level to allied organisations who share our broad aims with an invitation to come together to explore opportunities for joint working towards winning mainstream support for a new settlement for working class people won through genuine participatory democracy not necessarily limited to traditional structures
Utilises all its resources to contribute to a programme of political education designed to support the above aims
Encourages its Officers to seize the initiative now to broaden support for these aims through proactive media interventions, publication of articles, opinion pieces, blogs and a coordinated social media campaign
Through its network of Trade Councils, seeks to play a leading role in the community organising necessary to prepare to win the post-pandemic social settlement in our interests
Monitors, critiques and effectively challenges attempts to structure economic and democratic reforms in the immediate aftermath of the crisis which are contrary to the aims set out above
We have seen a big increase in the number of transphobic hate crimes recorded by police forces in England, Scotland and Wales. This is a rise that cannot be explained solely by an increase in confidence trans people have in reporting hate crime incidents to the police.
Unions, reps and our members have an essential role to play in fighting all forms of discrimination, including transphobia and transphobic hate incidents and crimes. Workplace representatives are key in supporting a trans member in the workplace. As with all union best practice it is best to negotiate policies on trans inclusion and equality before any issues arise.
This guide will help you understand what transphobic hate incidents is, what to do if you witness a transphobic hate incident, how to report the incident, and tips for reducing transphobia in the workplace.
Special thanks to TUC LGBT+ Committee, Equality Officers, TUC affiliated unions and Melanie Stray, Hate Crime Policy & Campaigns Manager from Galop for the support in putting this guide together.
When The Chancellor announced the latest extension to the furlough scheme we were right to demand that the furlough scheme must be 100% for those on minimum wage.
Under the furlough scheme, employees are paid 80 % of their contractual wages, giving the employer the option to top this up to 100%.
Whilst the furlough scheme has undoubtedly saved jobs, new pay data highlights a flaw in the scheme and that is that there is every chance workers will be paid less than the National Minimum Wage.
Again we call upon the government to act immediately to introduce a safety net to ensure that no workers falls below the NMW.
Low-earners and young workers hardest hit
The latest data from the Annual Survey of Hours and Earnings (ASHE), shows that low-paid, part-time and young workers are significantly more likely to be on furlough with reduced pay. In April, more than half of employees in the lowest docile of hourly earnings (earning less than £8.72 per hour) were furloughed and receiving reduced pay.
This means low earners were five-times more likely to be furloughed on reduced pay.
This is likely linked to the industries they work in.
The proportion of employees furloughed without being paid the top-up was highest in industries such as hospitality (39 per cent), the arts (27 per cent), and construction (26 per cent).
Pushing workers below the minimum wage
Living off 80 per cent of your wages would be a struggle for most people and its more likely to have more impact the less expendable income people have as those on higher wages will not feel the full impact of a 20% drop as their other stoppages will also be reduced.
In April, 7.2 per cent of employees were paid below the National Minimum Wage (NMW) or National Living Wage (NLW) which equates to just over two million people not being paid the legal minimum with those most likely to be affected to be Young workers, part-time workers and workers in the hospitality sectors
These new findings on furlough pay reflect something we’ve known for months: the pandemic is hitting low-paid workers hardest and that unionised workplaces are more likely to be safer and better paid have better access to sick pay
Fixing the flaw
The government must ensure the pay of no furloughed worker drops below the legal minimum wage and agree to the TUC demand that the National Minimum Wage set to £10 per hour for all.
BCM Fareva dispute: Usdaw to ballot on industrial action at the Nottinghamshire based manufacturer of Boots products
Usdaw, the trade union for staff at BCM Ltd is to ballot members on industrial action in a year-long pay dispute with BCM Ltd, which is part of the Fareva group and is based at the Boots site in Beeston, Nottinghamshire.
Usdaw has expressed frustration at the company’s continued refusal to make a pay offer for staff who have worked throughout the coronavirus pandemic and urges the manufacturer to end their pay freeze before the union is forced into the last resort of industrial action.
Daniel Adams – Usdaw National Officer says: “Following extensive dialogue with BCM Fareva for over a year, we have been unable to reach an agreement on the 2020 Pay Review. Despite Usdaw indicating we were willing to consider various options and compromises to reach agreement, at no time have the company put forward any offer other than a pay freeze, nor shown any willingness to compromise, in an attempt to achieve a negotiated resolution to our discussions.
“Our members have continued to work throughout the coronavirus pandemic without additional reward or recognition and understandably believe they deserve better.
“It is incredibly disappointing that we have found ourselves in the position where we feel we have no option but to ballot for industrial action. Having balloted our members on the company’s final offer of a pay freeze, which was overwhelmingly rejected, the Union had agreed to pause discussions given the onset of the coronavirus pandemic.
“When talks resumed the company continued to refuse to make any offer in relation to pay. We undertook a consultative industrial action ballot which showed a majority of members were willing to take action. The company maintain that they will not be making any investment in pay this year and as such, we are now looking to proceed to a formal industrial action ballot. Industrial action is always a last resort for our members and it is with significant regret that we have been forced into this position.
“We have confirmed to the business that we remain available for talks at any time and want to achieve a negotiated resolution to the current situation. However, for those talks to be meaningful we would need to see some willingness to compromise from the company.”
Bolton TUC 