PCS: Fighting the austerity agenda - 'Action gets results'

By John McInally, Vice President, Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS)

From: http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/15975/15-01-2013/pcs-fighting-the-austerity-agenda-action-gets-results

The coalition government's austerity programme is being increasingly exposed as a disaster for all but the business and banking elite.

Tory strategists now assume theirs will be a one-term government. That is one reason for their scorched earth policy.

They know that if Labour is elected, its embrace of austerity policies will mean a 'safe pair of hands'.

The civil service is again in the firing line. A leaked letter from the Cabinet Office says: "If the reforms are implemented, the Civil Service of the future will be smaller, flatter, more unified, more digital, more accountable for delivery, more capable, better managed, and ultimately - more fun to work for".

This management-speak gibberish cannot conceal the real intention - to cherry-pick what services can be squeezed for profit and discard the rest.

Everything will be up for attack according to ministers, including annual and flexi leave, sick pay, mobility, probation, discipline and grievance procedures, as well as travel and expenses and trade union facilities.

Ministers, such as multi-millionaire Francis Maude, recognise that PCS's unwavering policy of 'No Cuts No Privatisation' has been at the heart of organised resistance to their austerity policies.

PCS never accepted the 'need' for austerity and its campaign for an alternative based on tax justice, investment and job creation, derided as deficit denial, exposes the insanity of the market.

That is why the left-led PCS leadership is seen as public enemy No 1 by the government.
Attack on union organisation

The Tories are wrong if they think cutting trade union facilities to below the statutory minimum will mean activists and members will let them destroy jobs, living standards and services. These attacks will breed a new, more determined generation of trade union activists.

These attacks, including attacks on the health service and other areas of the public sector, are only possible because of the abject crisis of leadership in the labour and trade union movement.

Ex-TUC general secretary Brendan Barber has retired. He's off to enjoy his huge pension and pay-off while the millions of members he once sold out have had their pension rights stolen.

After being pressured, not least by PCS, into 'leading' the magnificent two-million strong public sector strike on 30 November last year Barber, in virtual open collusion with Tory minister, Francis Maude, tried to strangle the fight-back by 'selling' the so-called Heads of Agreement. This was instead of organising further action.

At the TUC in September 2012, unions voted for joint coordinated action and also to discuss the "practicalities" of calling a general strike.

Yet Barber, perhaps with an eye to future ennoblement, on the morning of the debate told the media a general strike wouldn't happen.

PCS has always argued, most recently by president Janice Godrich at the TUC general council before Christmas, the most effective way to defeat the government's austerity policies is by joint coordinated action.

PCS will do everything in its power to build the widest possible coalition across public and private sector unions to oppose the austerity programme, including recently writing to all unions.

We are flexible about plans to coordinate industrial action. But we cannot wait while these attacks on terms and conditions go ahead.

PCS will not stand back and allow the government to steal members' rights and continue yet another year of pay cuts.

Some members are now facing a fourth year of pay freezes and living standards have fallen by an average of £1,200.

If this is not challenged then the government will think it can make it the norm for the next decade or more. This issue is the best opportunity to build coordinated action across the public sector.

PCS would far rather negotiate but will ballot members in February if the government refuses our request for talks.

The ballot will cover jobs, pensions, privatisation and all the issues covered by the previous national ballot.

But it will also focus sharply on the assault on terms and conditions and pay. The ballot would be for discontinuous strike action and discontinuous action short of a strike. If the Tories think PCS are contemplating "protest" action they can think again.

They should understand now we will respond by organising the most effective programme of disruptive action the civil service has ever seen.

A vital part of PCS's response will be ongoing and developing disputes in the departmental groups. These will be coordinated by the national union.

Major concessions, including increased staffing, have already been won by the union. PCS members in the Home Office, Driving Standards Agency and HMRC have all won concessions.

DWP members have also taken action and won significant gains in the contact centre dispute and the long-running Merseyside dispute.

DWP members have voted by 2:1 in opposition to compulsory redundancy notices being issued.

Members in other public sector unions whose members also face attacks, will wonder why their leaders are not organising action.

TUC unions have been asked to set out their views on the "practicalities" of a general strike, from the motion moved by the prison officer's union POA and passed by TUC Congress. The responses of some 'leaders' are entirely predictable - they won't be supporting a general strike anytime soon, how could they ever explain that to Ed Miliband and Ed Balls?

Every union in the TUC has a current or potential dispute with their employer on jobs, pay or other issues such as privatisation. All that is required is for the TUC to call these unions together and name the day.

Whatever the leadership of the TUC decides at its next meeting, the demand for a general strike will not go away.

Most serious trade union activists and members now know a 24-hour general strike is the most effective way to start to take on this government.

Trade union leaders who are serious about organising action in a "coalition of the willing" should discuss coordinating their ballots - as was done for the N30 pension strike last year.

Attacks are increasing. But the resistance against austerity is also. The cowardly role of right-wing trade union leaders will be sharply exposed.

PCS's fighting, campaigning leadership, along with its battle-hardened activists and members, will face the government attacks by fighting back. Campaigning works and action gets results.

Tom Baldwin for Mayor! - Eve of Poll Rally this Wed 14th

Trade Unionist & Socialist Against Cuts

Eve of Poll Rally

Bristol Council House, College Green

Wednesday 14th 2012

7.30pm

Speakers: 

Dave Nellist - former Socialist Party councillor in Coventry

John McInally - PCS NEC, personal capacity 

Tom Baldwin TUSC mayoral candidate

BADACA: John McInally gives 'rousing speech' - stand together, fight to win!

See the following article in the today's Bristol Evening Post reporting on last nights Bristol & District Anti-Cuts Alliance, including a long quote from PCS Vice-President John McInally, "who gave a rousing speech about the need for trade unions to stand side by side in opposition to the Government's plans."


http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/Union-speaker-warns-public-services-strikes/story-15155543-detail/story.html

TEACHERS and other public services staff in Bristol are gearing up for more strikes in their fight against Government cuts.

More than 150 union members and representatives from other organisations opposed to cuts to pensions, jobs and public services packed into the Council House last night for a rally.

The Unite the Resistance meeting, organised by Bristol and District Anti-Cuts Alliance, called for members of unions to stand together and fight against proposals.

General secretary of the Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) Mark Serwotka had been due to attend the event but was replaced by the union's vice-president John McInally, who gave a rousing speech about the need for trade unions to stand side by side in opposition to the Government's plans.

Accompanied by regular bouts of applause from the floor, he called on trade unionists to continue to fight cuts which he said would affect the most vulnerable members of society.

Mr McInally, right, said that there would be further industrial action by March, following on from a day of action in November which was supported by thousands of union members in Bristol.

"Bristol and District Anti-Cuts Alliance is a shining example of how we take battle into our workplaces and give the trade union movement the best possible example of how we beat this Government," he said. "We need to build a leadership that spends more time fighting this and less time fighting their activists."

Jane Taylor, of union Unite, told the meeting that campaigns against the cuts needed to be "built at a local level so that national statements are not hollow".

"People are insecure about their future, they are worried about their jobs and how they pay their bills," she said. "As a trade unionist I believe the role of trade unions is to give a voice to the overwhelming numbers of people."

David Wilshire of the CWU union said cuts had already affected 350 workers in Bristol involved in administering TV licences who were told last month they would be losing their jobs....
Read the rest: http://www.thisisbristol.co.uk/Union-speaker-warns-public-services-strikes/story-15155543-detail/story.html

Video: N30 Bristol Demo

20,000 Unison, Unite, GMB and over 20 unions, marched against the attacks on workers in the largest trade union demonstration in Bristol since 1932. Featuring Nina Franklin, President NUT, John McInally, Vice President PCS, Dave Wilshire CWU and Nigel Costley South West TUC.

Bristol: November 30 shows...WE CAN WIN

TUC must set the date: next united strike before 31 January
Extract of the speech given by John McInally, PCS civil service union vice-president, at the Bristol strike rally on 30 November:

In every town and city throughout the country, millions of workers are sending a message to the coalition government - we will not allow you to steal our hard-earned pension rights.
The austerity programme is a disaster. It means unemployment of 2.6 million. It means youth unemployment over one million. It means pay freezes while the richest 1% stuff their bank accounts with obscene, unearned wealth.
It means the biggest transfer of wealth and power in history through a privatisation programme which signals the end of free education and health.
And, let's be clear, the problem is not that they are cutting 'too fast' and 'too deep' - the problem is they are cutting at all.
There can be no excuse for this attack on pensions - public sector pensions are affordable. They are sustainable. And, they are falling in cost.
Pensions are only deferred wages. The average civil service pension, if you take away the tiny percentage of high earners, is only £80 a week - hardly a fortune.
The truth is this government wants us to endure a lifetime of low pay followed by an impoverished old age. They have sought to divide public sector workers from private sector workers. However, the real division in society is between the haves and the have-nots.
Our slogan is "fair pensions for all". When rich Tory ministers talk about "fairness" between private and public sector pensions what they mean is a race to the bottom - they want to impose on us the worst pension provision they can get away with.
That is why we must stand together to defeat this attack. But they couldn't get away with this if the Labour Party were not committed to protecting corporate interests above those of the vast majority in this country.
If the main political parties in this country are incapable of representing the interests of the vast majority, then it is time we do so ourselves.
We will use all campaigning methods to defeat these attacks. We will oppose them in the courts, in our workplaces, in our communities too. I urge everyone not only to support your trade union but also the anti-cuts alliance in your own town or city. If there isn't one - then set one up.
We give our solidarity and full support to the pensioners' alliances, the students and the school students and the Occupy movement.
After 30 November's brilliant show of strength and solidarity we must prepare for further action if the government does not concede. PCS believes that theTUC must announce at its upcoming meeting that - as an absolute minimum - we organise another national day of action.
That means escalation by getting even more unions on board, including private sector workers fighting for their pension rights too.
All targeted, selective or rolling action taken by individual unions must be coordinated for maximum impact.
But the way to win is to demonstrate our power as we have done so today.
National coordinated industrial action is the key to defeating the attack on pensions and the cuts themselves.
http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/13260/30-11-2011/30-november-shows-we-can-win

Con-Dems' pension attack - brutal class warfare must be fought

John McInally, Bristol - national vice-president PCS (personal capacity)

http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/articles/12240/17-06-2011/con-dems-pension-attack-brutal-class-warfare-must-be-fought

The government is attempting to steal £2.8 billion from public sector pensions in Britain. This is a brutal act of class warfare directed against millions of mainly low-paid workers.
Attempting to prosecute it is a tiny ruling elite, who despise the public sector and those who deliver the vital services that bind our communities together.
Propaganda about public sector "gold-plated" pensions and conditions at the expense of everyone else, especially private sector workers, is the ideological 'justification' for a state-instigated hate campaign against public sector workers.
PCS members have voted for action alongside three education unions on 30 June. These four unions have three quarters of a million members.
This will be the first major coordinated industrial action against the Tory-led coalition's cuts and privatisation programme.
PCS members have voted not just for a day of action nor to only defend pensions but for a programme of discontinuous action which will allow the national union to coordinate action to defend jobs, pay and conditions, which are all under attack now.
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka was quoted in the Mirror saying that the campaign "... will be about sustained action. This government will not turn after one or two days. Members have got to be prepared for that".

Strategy

This strategy will be a significant element in building for mass coordinated industrial action in the autumn.
The National Association of Head Teachers is the latest union to announce it will also ballot its members about striking over pension cuts. Potentially there could be between three and five million workers striking against the coalition cuts in the autumn.
Pensions are the great unifying factor in the public sector. Every single worker will suffer appalling detriment if the government's plans are realised, with women being hit disproportionately by these attacks. 
The plans are based on the report by anti-union ex-Labour minister John Hutton, a truly despicable creature, awash with lucrative sponsorships for services rendered to corporate interests.
The civil service has operated on an unwritten contract that job security and reasonable pensions, which are deferred wages, were the trade-off for low wages.
The average civil service pension for full service, excluding the tiny percentage of high earners, is £4,200 a year.
Hard-working public sector workers are the victims, not the cause of the economic crisis. We are now being asked to pay again, with what is effectively a tax on public sector pensions to pay off the deficit caused by the bankers and their system.

Victims, not the cause

The proposals will mean members will be expected to double or treble their contributions (the value of an extra day's work a month), work until age 68, and accept cuts of 20-50% in the value of pensions.
Our pensions' value has already been reduced by 15-25% because of the un-agreed re-indexing of pensions and benefits. PCS and other unions have mounted a legal challenge on this.
But the attack is not about dry statistics, it represents a shocking assault on living standards of some of the lowest paid workers in society who are also facing pay freezes, savage assaults on conditions, privatisation and the threat of job losses.
Even the Tories have voiced concern that the changes to contributions will lead to workers simply opting out of the scheme with horrendous implications for the future of pension provision.
This has been cited as part of the reason for Lib Dem treasury minister Danny Alexander's proposal to taper the increase in pension contributions.
Public sector workers now face a life of low pay followed by an impoverished old age, and they will be expected, as taxpayers, to fund the means-tested benefits necessary to support increasing numbers living below the poverty line.

Poverty

The official poverty line is £170 a week, the state pension is £102 a week; reduced occupational pensions will increase the number of pensioners in poverty - currently 2.5 million. 3.5 million pensioners are in fuel poverty.
In Germany pensions are 70% of average earnings, though set to fall. Even in the USA, for 40 years of work, social security provides 40% of previous earnings.
In France, 12% of GDP is spent on pensions, 10% in Germany, but in Britain, a measly 6%.
The net cost of paying public sector pensions in 2009/10 was a little under £4 billion. The cost of providing tax relief to the 1% who earn more than £150,000 is more than twice as much.
The total cost of providing tax relief to all higher rate taxpayers, on their private pensions, is more than five times as much.
There is an all-out campaign to divide public and private sector workers by claiming that pensions for the former are at the expense of the latter. In reality many households are comprised of people working in both sectors; the idea that low paid private sector workers are supportive of the cuts in other family members' pensions is garbage.
Workers won't buy the argument there should be an equality of misery.

Companies took pension 'holidays'

The removal of decent pension provision throughout the private sector was due to the fact that in the 1980s and 1990s companies took pension 'holidays' that left schemes under-funded.
When legislation was introduced to guarantee levels of funding, it increased the rate of pension fund closures as companies were unprepared to fund schemes at shareholders' expense.
The loss of these schemes did not, during a period of comparative economic boom, save jobs, guarantee pay rises or help to avoid financial meltdown in the private sector.
The only beneficiaries were the bosses and shareholders.
PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka rightly describes current negotiations with Cabinet Minister Francis Maude as a "farce". This is confirmed by Danny Alexander's disgraceful intervention on Friday 17 June, pre-empting negotiations between ministers and unions. Maude wants the unions to go into sector bargaining without any compromise on the core national issues of increased contributions, cuts in the value of schemes and the rise in the working age.
Maude and Alexander clearly aim to sow division by putting the unions at each other's throats by fighting over the distribution of the cuts rather than opposing them outright.

PCS adamant

But PCS is adamant that these key principles must be collectively opposed and negotiated on, before sector talks take place.
Already, under the threat of strike action Alexander has announced that workers earning less than £15,000 won't have any increase in contributions. But this must be confirmed in negotiations.
Those earning less than £18,000 will have their contributions capped at 1.5%. But only 4% of PCS members earn less than £15,000 and across the public sector it is 1%.
And these low-paid workers will still suffer the increased retirement age and all the other aspects of the attack.
Workers earning more than £18,000 could have their contributions raised by up to 5%. The increases will be phased in over three years from next April.
This is clearly an attempt to divide the opposition and must be resisted.
The Labour leader, Ed Miliband, said the government was "hopelessly mismanaging" the pension issue. But Labour also attempted to increase the pension age in 2005 but was thwarted by the threat of coordinated public sector strike action.
Echoing the shameful Labour line that while the coalition is "cutting too deep and too quickly" cuts are nevertheless 'necessary' and 'inevitable', some union leaders signalled concessions upfront.
The coalition government is now trying to tempt them into an unholy alliance against PCS and other unions by isolating the 'militants' who, according to Alexander "seem hell bent on premature strike action".
Ed Balls too is getting in on the act, saying that by striking the unions are walking into a Tory trap. On the contrary, by striking they are merely defending working people's interests, something Balls and Labour are incapable of.
The position must be unequivocal - no cuts or privatisation. Accepting the need for cuts is the road to division and defeat.
On pensions, we are facing organised theft on a huge scale by a government of millionaires with no mandate - economic terrorism against the vast majority waged to increase the obscene wealth of a tiny minority who place profit before people.
We face a defining battle for our movement. Real leadership is required, based on a strategy of no cuts, and no concessions to pension robbery.
We must build the kind of widespread industrial action capable of defeating and bringing down this government.