Fighting job losses - members at Steria vote for strike

Congratulations to UNITE members at IT company Steria in Manchester, who have voted by a sizable majority to strike in protest at planned redundancies.

Let's ensure that they get a mass of messages of support (details here). If Steria don't see sense we must all help ensure the action is as effective as possible. This ballot result should be an inspiration to members elsewhere faced with redundancy - it is possible to fight.

Meanwhile UNITE is taking part in an international day of action to protest against planned job losses after the takeover of EDS by HP.

Fighting redundancies

I understand the ballot for industrial action among UNITE members at Steria in Manchester closed today, but I haven't heard the result yet.

Let's hope the delays of the painful balloting process haven't undermined people's confidence to fight. The United Campaign to Repeal the Anti-Trade Union Laws reports on the debates and vote in parliament on amendments intended to take small steps in this direction. The vote itself was on an amendment relating to making the ballot process less of a minefield. The campaign's report highlights this as the biggest revolt of Labour MPs under Brown's leadership, with 45 Labour MPs voting to slightly improve workers' rights. While this is quite an achievement for campaigners, it is also an indictment of the Parliamentary Labour Party that there were so few. Perhaps the headline for the story should have been "45 MPs find backbone"?

Meanwhile another tragedy is unfolding for manufacturing in Manchester, with the threatened closure of Rolls Royce Crossley Engines - already a shadow of its former self.

Nominating Laurence Faircloth for UNITE Joint General Secretary

I'm pleased to see that there's now a proper leaflet out seeking nominations for Laurence Faircloth, the candidate backed by Amicus Unity Gazette, the broad left in our union. It gives the lie to the claim by Derek Simpson that there are no policy differences between the candidates.

My own branch decided unanimously to nominate Laurence at its meeting last week.

Launch of Karen Reissmann legal defence fund

When any union activist is victimised, we should all be quick off the mark to support them.

The campaign to defend Karen Reissmann, the UNISON activist and Manchester mental health nurse, has the added dimension that she was victimised for speaking out in defence of the NHS. It is in the interests of every supporter of the NHS as well as every trade unionist to support her campaign.

The strike and ongoing campaign in defence of Karen has made a real impact in Manchester, helping rebuild the traditions of solidarity and the networks that we all need.

Karen has had to launch a financial appeal to fund her tribunal case, after UNISON disgracefully withdrew support. You can download an appeal letter and collection sheet. The photo below is from the press launch of the appeal.

Runners & Riders in the UNITE-Amicus General Secretary election

Nominations are now open for the election for a UNITE Joint General Secretary from the Amicus section, for a 1-year term of office from 23rd December 2009 to 23rd December 2010.

As I've previously pointed out, this is an election we could have done without. Indeed, on the UNITE Executive Council I voted against the rule changes that brought it about. However, the decision was taken so we now need to ensure the outcome is as beneficial to members as possible.

There are four candidates who have declared:
1) Derek Simpson, the incumbent.
2) Jerry Hicks
3) Laurence Faircloth, who is backed by Amicus Unity Gazette, the broad left grouping
4) Kevin Coyne

I'll be trying to ensure my branch nominates Laurence, who was selected as the left candidate at an open national meeting of the Amicus Unity Gazette yesterday. Neither Jerry nor Derek sought support from the left.

I supported Derek in his original election campaign, and have absolutely no regrets about doing so. It was a significant step forward for our union at the time. However, time has moved on, and so have the issues and the individuals. I believe Derek is now obstructing the integration process for the sake of influence over the more important election for General Secretary Designate, which will take place during 2010. The original argument for Derek staying on to 66 was to help with continuity with the merger. What we're seeing now is the exact opposite. In a context where jobs are being lost by the thousand, I don't think "everything in UNITE is fine - carry on" is a good argument.

Kevin is the Regional Secretary for the North-West. He is very capable, which is reflected in his professional web site and campaign. However, he has always been closely identified with the right-wing in the union, and moving even closer to New Labour doesn't really seem the best plan at the moment!

Derek recently broke from Amicus Unity Gazette to launch a new right-wing faction in the union called the "Workers Uniting Group", bringing together his close allies with those who had always been openly on the right, including Kevin. Personal ambition from both Derek and Kevin seems to have exceeded their commitment to their new political project, as they are standing against each other.

Jerry was a courageous fighter on behalf of his members, who was victimised by Rolls Royce. I would agree with many of the points Jerry makes in his election address. Unfortunately, Jerry has become increasingly out of touch since his victimisation, which must have contributed to bad decisions such as launching a court case against his own union. To make our union better, we need change at every level, not just one person at the top.

Laurence is currently the Regional Secretary for the South-West. He was briefly the Regional Secretary in my own region - the North-West, where he proved to be a very capable officer. He was only selected as the left candidate on Saturday, so there is relatively little material out about his campaign yet. At the meeting he confirmed that he was standing on the basis of Gazette policies, such as:

• A more vigorous response to the economic crisis, in particular fighting job losses
  
• Support for election of officers and increased accountability to the lay-member structures of the union
• Stopping the unconditional handing over vast sums centrally to the Labour Party, in favour of making contributions regionally so that the union can ensure we are supporting those who support us

As well as his blog, there is also a Facebook group for Laurence's campaign.

Media finally begins to pick up Coop offshoring scandal

It is remarkable how little media coverage there has been of the plan to offshore to India work for Cooperative Financial Services (CFS) currently being carried out by Steria in Manchester - especially when this goes completely against the Coop's carefully cultivated brand image and is leading to threats of compulsory redundancies and a strike ballot.

Good to see this report, albeit in a fairly obscure publication.

IT National Advisory Committee

Last week I took part in a very well attended and interesting UNITE "National Advisory Committee" for the IT industry. Stripped of the jargon, this means a meeting of union reps from various companies in the IT industry.

The process of groups with union organisation TUPEing into the IT industry continues. In terms of UNITE organisation, this is predominantly from the Finance sector at the moment.

We had a video link-up and presentation from India, where we are building links with UNITES (no relation), a union beginning to build in the IT and Business Process Outsourcing industries. These are small but very important beginnings. When workers in the UK see employers cutting jobs and transferring work to India it is too easy to see Indian workers as the enemy, rather than seeing them as potential allies in resisting the attempts by employers to drive down pay and conditions globally. There was a good discussion about practical ways of supporting each other.

We had a brief update on the HQ response to the motion passed at the sector conference about the planned UNITE "IT and Communications" sector. Not much had changed, though we were told that the Communication Managers Association (CMA) were happy with being in our sector, even if we didn't think it was appropriate.

We had a presentation from Incomes Data Services (IDS) about pay trends in the IT industry, which provoked a considerable amount of discussion. They get data from both employers and unions, and are keen to get more so that the quality of their research is improved. We also had a look at a report from e-Skills UK, which is the "sector skills council". This sort of pay data is invaluable for any rep negotiating pay.

We had a brief update on the union's work on learning in our sector from Sunil Patel, who has been heavily involved in the development of the ITQ qualification, which are aimed at IT users. It's all too easy to forget that large numbers of those working in the IT industry aren't in IT-based jobs or don't have qualifications in IT.

We discussed progress with organising and recruitment in the sector. Best progress is being made in EDS and Fujitsu, where there have been sustained and fairly systematic efforts to build the union. A bigger, stronger union means better results for employees. This doesn't just mean people filling in Direct Debit forms - it has to mean getting members involved, recruiting and training new reps etc.

We discussed about the situation at Steria in Manchester, where members are being balloted for action as part of a campaign against compulsory redundancies. As is normally the case when you get a bunch of reps together, the discussion produced some fresh ideas for taking the campaign forward. We all felt that in the current economic climate it is becoming even more important to take a stand against redundancies wherever possible.