UNISON delegates were given a frightening glimpse of how very much worse privatisation could become in the UK, if we’re not careful.
Jane Carter, of the American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employee (AFSCME) described the battles unions face “over the pond”, to preserve both workers’ rights and public services.
Ms Carter is a labour economist with the largest and fastest growing union in the US, with 1.6 million members, who – much like UNISON’s – work across public services.
She spoke of the “concerted effort” to undermine workers rights in the US – the right to vote, to collective action, and the right to have a decent wage.
But she specifically described the work of the American Legislative Exchange Council (ALEC), a right-wing organisation of CEOs and state legislators that puts the Tax Payers Alliance in the shade.
This “bill mill” devises model legislation that is then used in different states to attack existing, positive laws on such diverse things as collective bargaining, clean energy and procurement regulations.
In particular, it pushes through privatisation legislation throughout the US, using what Ms Carter described as a “yellow pages” approach.
“A local mayor will sit behind closed doors with business leaders and they open the phone book. If there’s a company that provides janitor services, they will privatize the public janitor services, handing them over to that company. If a company has a call centre service, they will shut down the public health call centre and give it to the private sector.”
In the same way they privatise prison services and water plants, she said. One bill even eliminates ownership of state property, with Arizona recently selling its capital building.
Ms Carter said the onus was on the unions to fight back, to prove the value of “cutting the fat, not the muscle” and running services efficiently in the public sector.
“We have to stop this corporate takeover of services we provide. If we don’t, we will have hell to pay at the end of the day.”
American Federation of State, County and Municipal Employees