- Conference
- 2003 National Delegate Conference
- Date
- 5 February 2003
- Decision
- Carried as Amended
Conference celebrates UNISON’s forthcoming tenth anniversary on 1 July 2003 and acknowledges the achievements of our union in campaigning for fair pay and conditions for all workers, for the rights of trade union members, for our campaigns against racism, sexism and disabilism and international trade unionism.
We must now make the next ten years a route to ensure that UNISON remains the outstanding and strong union that it is today.
Whilst we welcome the £93 billion additional investment programme announced in the Comprehensive Spending Review 2002 we have also seen in ten years the number of Private Finance Initiative (PFI) schemes double, we have seen millions poured into capital works commissioned through the private sector, we have seen the Government pledge that it will continue to have mixed economy in the delivery of public services and we have seen record numbers of our members transferred to private sector or quasi-public organisations.
Conference further welcomes the introduction of the Best Value Code of Practice, issued on 13 March 2003, which must be written in to all new and re-tendered contracts between local authorities and private, community or voluntary contractors in England (and equivalent protocols in Scotland and Wales)
For UNISON to continue to grow as a union and to fully embrace the challenges that face all of our service groups within this changing landscape we must stock take on our achievements but look forward to using our experiences to secure the best interests of our members for the future.
Conference notes the impact of devolution, both geo-political and in the movement of members across UNISON boundaries, has had on our organising and bargaining agenda, with implications for appropriate levels of resourcing and deployment of staff. These issues were discussed at the seminars of the regions and service groups in February 2003, addressing the impact of devolution on the bargaining agenda and resourcing the regions.
Conference notes the work already done on branch restructuring but too often we see members facing transfers to companies where we have no recognition, where lay activists are prevented, unlawfully, from representing members in those companies or face an attack on facilities arrangements, where the union has failed to achieve TUPE plus agreement and where organisationally we often fail to recruit new starters within those companies leaving thousands of potential members without the protection they deserve from a union such as ours.
Conference, therefore, instructs the the National Executive Council to take urgent action to stem the decline in union organisation post transfers to the private sector organisation whilst reaffirming the continuation of our public services campaign against privatisation, by ensuring that we:
1)equip branches and regions with access to model recognition agreements and transfer agreements that enshrine our policies to protect members’ pensions and terms and conditions and guard against the creation of a two-tier workforce;
2)ensure a training programme is developed for staff and activists on model agreements to transform our very worthy policies into realities on the ground;
3)take cognisance of the current climate when examining where members are best placed at a regional level to ensure that they continue to receive the best representation post transfer or when new service structures are created such as in health so that the interests of members are best preserved;
4)ensure guidance to regions/branches with pro-formas to be produced that ensure memberships transfers are done efficiently, that transferring members are tagged to a new employer within RMS and that RMS continues to be developed as an organising tool to ensure that the union is able to effect industrial action ballots when needed within private companies;
5)ensure that there is ongoing mapping of private companies/union resource allocation to embrace the organising agenda where it is needed at the local level rather than the mere concept of an organising union at a strategic level;
6)ensure a cross service group review of resource allocation to ensure that service groups have the ability to place financial and staffing resources where they are most needed to deliver UNISON’s agenda;
7)reconvene the seminar of regions and service groups in the autumn to receive reports for the further considerations of the Staffing and Finance Committees and the Senior Management Group, prior to considering any issues which may require a decision of Conference 2004;
8)require regions to develop strategies, in conjunction with branches, for reviewing current recognition status with all private and voluntary employers, and for seeking to secure improvements in those found lacking;
9)build on the opportunities provided by the new two-tier workforce code to revisit those recognition agreements which currently exclude new starters by devising strategies to secure extension to include them;
10)recognise that effective representation and organisation of members in the private and voluntary sector will, in the long term, only be achieved if we develop and sustain a strong structure of workplace organisation, founded on stewards and other elected representatives, and put measures in place to establish these.