WHITEHALL cleaners, security guards and support staff are to strike for five days after being offered a below-inflation pay rise.
They are angry to have been offered just a 3.5 per cent rise by outsourced contractor ISS when inflation is running at 6.8 per cent, the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union said.
Nearly 100 PCS members at the Department for Energy Security & Net Zero, Department for Business & Trade and Department for Science, Innovation & Technology are set to take action from September 4 to 8.
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: “It’s obscene that ISS can afford to pay board members £988,000 — a rise of 8.9 per cent from last year — yet claim they can’t afford to pay cleaners a fair rise.
The Trades Union Congress (TUC) has organised an emergency protest on Monday 22nd May for 6.00pm outside Parliament Square, as it fights to protect the right to strike which is under attack from the Tory government.
Mick Lynch from the RMT, Matt Wrack from the FBU and Kevin Courtney will be speaking at the rally, with Unison, USDAW and the PCS union all showing their support.
The government’s strikes bill, which will empower employers to sue unions and sack staff in crucial sectors if minimum service levels aren’t maintained, has been slammed as an attack on the fundamental right to strike and as a draconian piece of legislation. The Bill essentially means that when workers lawfully vote to strike in health, education, fire, transport, border security and nuclear decommissioning, they could be forced to attend work – and sacked if they don’t comply.
The TUC said in a press statement: “We can’t afford to lose the right to strike. But multi-millionaire Tory politicians are attacking our right to strike for better pay and fair treatment at work.
Former Chancellor Kwasi Kwarteng has once more refused to apologise for his disastrous mini-budget which caused financial turmoil and which eventually led to him being sacked and Liz Truss being forced out of office.
Kwarteng, whose mini-budget resulted in chaos on the financial markets, the pound hitting an all-time low against the dollar and mortgage rates soaring, said he was ‘not in the business of forgiveness’.
“I’m not going to apologise,” he told Channel 4 News.
Former Tory MP and now Reform UK party member Ann Widdecombe has been widely condemned for her ‘out of touch’ and appalling comments on families struggling to make ends meet during the cost of living crisis.
Widdecombe was asked on BBC 2’s Politics Live programme about the cost of living crisis and what advice she would give to viewers who could not even afford the basics.
Jo Coburn asked the former Tory MP: “What do you say to those viewers who literally can’t afford to pay even for some of the basics – if they’ve gone up the way that cheese sandwich has, with all its ingredients?”
“Well, then you don’t do the cheese sandwich,” Widdecombe replied.
Her comments were immediately condemned by fellow panellist Rachel Cunliffe who said: “We’re talking about absolute basics and staples. We’re talking about own-brand pasta, we’re talking about bread, we’re talking about families who can’t afford to feed their children.
‘The First Past the Post system hands more power to the establishment than MPs or people.’
The Mayor of Greater Manchester, Andy Burnham, has set out the reasons for why the Labour Party should back a change to the voting system in favour of proportional representation (PR), despite party leader Keir Starmer saying that voting reform will not be a priority should Labour win power.
Although the Labour Party conference last year overwhelmingly backed a motion calling on the party to embrace a proportional electoral system, the leadership has made clear that it would not do as the motion says.
Since then, at the Progressive Britain conference last week, Starmer made clear that voting reform would not be among the priorities should Labour win power.
Burnham however has urged the party to adopt PR, saying that the current first-past-the-post voting system hands more power to the establishment than MPs or people and changing the system to proportional representation would mean “every vote would matter”.
Carla Denyer claims Greens are the strongest party on democratic reform
Carla Denyer, Cost of Living Crisis, Bristol, 2 April 2022
The Green Party has slammed the Tories for dragging democracy in the UK in a dangerous direction.
Speaking at an event last night, co-leader of the Green Party of England and Wales, Carla Denyer, laid out how the Tory’s have assaulted our democracy – and how the Greens would solve it.
Denyer discussed how to restore public faith in politics and argued that the Greens were the strongest party on democratic reform.
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The Greens have said they would apply proportional representation for all elections to all levels of government, along with bringing the voting age down to 16.
They would introduce devolution, mirroring systems in Europe by giving more power to local and regional government and Scottish, Welsh and Northern Irish Parliament. They would also introduce an elected upper house to replace hereditary power in the House of Lord and set up a Citizen’s Convention.
Introducing a fairer system of state funding for political parties, which would hope to eliminate the dependence of large private donations and strengthen transparency on political lobbying and donations. One in four people believe that party donors have the most influence on government decisions, according to Unlock Democracy.
Denyer also accused the media of preventing democratic conversations through its bias towards certain political parties.
Jeremy Corbyn MP, former leader of the Labour Party
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At a time when the Tories are accelerating their assault on democracy, the Labour leadership should be fortifying its defense. However, it will not be able to defend democracy if it isn’t prepared to respect it within its own movement. Across the country, left-wing members are being barred from applying to be a candidate, denying local parties the chance to vote for popular, working-class, talented people in a fair and democratic selection process. As Keir Starmer himself promised in 2020, “Local Party members should select their candidates for every election.” Reneging on this pledge sends an alarming signal to those whose trust you now seek to garner.
It also displays a lack of respect for those to whom we owe our very place in Parliament. Labour members are the ones who give up their time to knock on doors in the pouring rain. Labour members are the ones who campaign for local change in their communities. Labour members are the ones who keep the party afloat. The Labour membership is the soul of the Labour Party — you cannot crush one without the other.
Only a democratic party can provide the space that is needed to empower those with the creative ideas and transformative solutions this country desperately needs. Today, the division between rich and poor and the threat of ecological collapse are greater than ever before. Our aim should be to unite disenfranchised communities around a more hopeful alternative.
