The government’s austerity measures are having a devastating effect on the services lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender people rely on.
Many LGBT UNISON members and potential members work providing these services. So there’s no better time than now to promote UNISON’s pro-public services agenda to the wider LGBT community.
David Cameron’s austerity measures are affecting the LGBT community by:
- closing down of police and justice hate crime work and the deletion of specialist LGBT liaison posts;
- swingeing cuts to sexual health programmes, including HIV services – both support for people with HIV and HIV prevention;
- year-on-year cuts to LGBT help lines and mental health services;
- closure of many initiatives supporting young LGBT people;
- lack of capacity for social workers to deal with issues arising from sexual orientation or gender identity discrimination;
- failure to fund gender reassignment treatments.
How does a presence at LGBT events help UNISON?
For a number of years, the general political fund (GPF) has funded UNISON’s participation in key national LGBT events including London Pride, Black Pride, Sparkle, BiCon, the LGBT Health Summit and scores of local pride events.
London Pride gets us to the largest number of people, but all the events allow us to meet target audiences.
Being named as a supporting organisation improves UNISON’s reputation as the trade union that speaks for LGBT workers. It also gives us a say in the planning and content of the events.
And of course we are there on the day, talking to people and signing up new members.
What message will UNISON be promoting at these events?
That UNISON understands and is concerned about the issues facing LGBT people as workers and as users of public services:
- that we understand the causes of the problems people face – and we can explode the myths and lies about these causes;
- that we have solutions.
The message is a simple one – LGBT workers are better off in UNISON.
The LGBT group is very experienced in maximising recruitment at the events it attends and has developed a range of targeted recruitment materials, recruitment scripts, training in face-to-face recruitment for our activists, and activities that draw in potential members.
How can LGBT members learn more about helping to get UNISON’s message out to the community?
Key dates and events in UNISON’s LGBT year can be found in this section of the union’s website.
To find out more contact out@unison.co.uk.
We look forward to hearing from you: we need your help to build the strength of public opinion behind the need to defend LGBT public services, to push home the message that the cuts are unnecessary and to recruit LGBT workers in to UNISON.
