Where’s your bus gone?

Conference condemns the ever increasing amount of disappearing bus services from Britain’s roads and the consequent impact on UNISON members employed in the public transport industry. This is due to the Government’s cuts agenda. Services are disappearing and fares are increasing, leaving the most vulnerable and those on low incomes more isolated and disadvantaged. There […]

UNISON calling

Conference notes that in 2012, UNISON launched the call centre charter, which calls on all employers who have UNISON members working in a call centre or in call handling operations to commit to improving the standards which those staff operate under. Conference notes that the charter was primarily aimed at branches in the energy service […]

Motion 8. Service v Targets.

For call centre staff in our water companies it is becoming increasingly difficult to deliver a quality service to the public due to internal pressures to ‘get rid of’ callers as quickly as possible. If a caller rings up to say they have cellar flooding or sewage coming into their property they are in a […]

Motion 4. Overseas suppliers

The larger water companies import much of their sewage and water pipes from Asia especially large diameter pipes used in capital schemes, in the case of Yorkshire Water from Kolkata in India via a UK subsidiary. This contract has been running for ten years. Our company has someone who monitors the contract and makes visits […]

Motion 1. Safety of Dig Teams

With ever more private companies laying electric cables and gas pipes on new build sites and companies being bought out or going bankrupt, the health and safety of dig teams on water contacts are being jeopardised because there is no central database. Buried services may belong to utilities, commercial sites, industrial sites or the military. […]

United Nations International Day of the Girl Child

This Conference welcomes the establishment of the United Nations International Day of the Girl Child, inaugurated this year on October 11 2012, and to be celebrated on October 11 every year thereafter. This Conference fully supports the aims of this event, i.e. to help galvanize worldwide enthusiasm for goals to better girls’ lives, providing an […]

Anti Abortion Groups

Conference is deeply disappointed that members of the anti-abortion group Abort67 have been found not guilty at Brighton Magistrates Court of public order offences for displaying material that is ‘threatening abusive or insulting’ outside the British Pregnancy Advisory Service (BPAS) Wistons clinic in Brighton. South East Regional women’s group disagree with this ruling. If a […]

Universal Credit and its effect on Child Poverty

Conference is aware of the growing issue of child poverty. There are 3.6 million children in poverty in the UK today, that’s more than 1 in 4 of our children. Although the issue of child poverty affects working families, 90% of single parent families are women and are therefore more likely to be welfare dependant. […]

OVARIAN CANCER – THE SILENT KILLER

Ovarian cancer is the fifth most common cancer in women in the UK, affecting around 6,800 women. It is the highest gynaecological killer of women in the UK and the fourth most common cause of death from cancer in women, with two out of every three cases of ovarian cancer being diagnosed when the disease […]

Equal Rights for both Intended Parents in Surrogacy

Conference notes that despite surrogacy being legal in the United Kingdom the intended parents have few legal rights unless they happen to be male. An intended father can gain shared parental responsibility as soon as the child is born by the child being registered in his name, with him named on the birth certificate as […]

Proportionality

Conference notes UNISON’s proud record on working towards equality both in its internal structures and in its bargaining and campaigning agenda. Conference notes that one of the key strategies for UNISON to achieve equality of representation and engagement within UNISON has been proportionality. Proportionality is defined as “the representation of women and men in fair […]

UNISON WOMEN: ACTIVE, CAMPAIGNING, LEADING

UNISON is proud to be the leading trade union for women. We have a solid history of women being at the heart of the union; through enshrining self organisation into our rule book along with proportionality. As a union which is majority female we do not just talk the talk. Women are the foundation on […]

Buddying and Mentoring

As National Women’s Conference is aware, UNISON is facing one of the most challenging times in our existence. One of the consequences of the job losses we are experiencing is the loss of many of our senior/experienced activists. Never has there been a more important time to encourage new women activists to come forward into […]

The hidden impact of cuts

Conference recognises that the brunt of this government’s cuts and austerity measures are being borne by women. 1) The number of unemployed women is at a twenty five year high, with more than a million women already jobless, and hundreds of thousands of public sector workers set to join their ranks. Further, UNISON research reveals […]