Playing Our Part – Mainstreaming Recruitment within our Self Organised Group

Conference notes that trade union membership density in most employers where UNISON has members has been falling in recent years and that less than one in two public sector workers are members of UNISON. Conference recognises that we need to grow in numbers and density to grow in influence with employers and the government and […]

Taking Our Place in Public Life

Conference notes that despite some high profile achievements, the participation of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) people in public and political life remains low. Stonewall’s 2008 “Serves you Right” report found that there were no openly gay or lesbian people in the British cabinet, the Scottish cabinet or the Welsh cabinet. There were only […]

Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) and LGBT Equality

Conference welcomes the creation of the EHRC whose job is to provide support to equality and human rights in England, Scotland and Wales, while in Northern Ireland (NI) the NI Equality Commission has existed for some time. Conference welcomes the fact that one of the areas prioritised by the Commission has been to litigate in […]

Homophobia in Sport

Conference welcomes the initiative launched by The Premiership and Football League in trying to rid football from homophobia. Whilst recognising that this is a good starting point, conference believes that more work is needed to ensure the campaign develops in success to the levels achieved by UNISON involvement in campaigns such as ‘Show Racism the […]

Working in Solidarity

Conference welcomes the progress made in raising the profile of lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) participation in our union. We can be proud of our achievements in continuing to support and encourage self organisation at all levels of our union. Most of us take it for granted that we can organise and meet to […]

Equality at the Heart of our Union – Equal Means Making it Happen

Conference affirms that lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) equality is an integral part of the organising and bargaining work of the union. Conference considers that UNISON’s Equality Scheme is a significant opportunity to achieve this. The purpose of the Equality Scheme is to make sure that equality is promoted and discrimination challenged in everything […]

Workplace Blood Donor Sessions

Conference is aware that some employers encourage their employees to donate blood by allowing the National Blood Service (NBS) to run donor sessions in the workplace. Conference notes that for people who may be unable to donate due to current donor selection criteria (including many gay and bisexual men, as well as people with medical […]

Building Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Equality in the Commonwealth

Conference welcomes: 1The UK Government’s stated commitment to working for the universal decriminalisation of homosexuality; 2The development and publication this year by the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO) of a strategy and toolkit for promoting and protecting the rights of LGBT people; 3Increasing recognition of the Yogyarkarta Principles on the application of international human rights […]

European Union (EU) Anti-Discrimination Legislation

Conference notes that European Union law provides protection against sexual orientation discrimination – as well as age, disability, religion and belief – in the area of employment, but that there is currently no such protection in EU law against discrimination on these grounds in areas such as social protection, goods and services, health care and […]

Increasing Effective Participation of Low Paid LGBT Members

Conference welcomes the new UNISON Equality Scheme which, in addition to covering the statutory equality streams of gender, gender identity, race, disability, sexual orientation, age and religion/belief, also seeks to ensure equality within the union on the grounds of low pay. Conference acknowledges that although the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) self organised group […]

Inequality in Goods, Facilities and Services

Conference is concerned that there remains inequality in the provision of goods, facilities and services to Transgender members especially in the case of medical treatment. Looking at Wales as an example, last year, this conference heard how the Health Commission Wales (HCW), a body of the Welsh Assembly set up to fund specialist services in […]

Supporting Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual and Transgender (LGBT) Members in the Highlands of Scotland

This conference welcomes the recent formation of a lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) Self-Organised Group (SOG) in the Highland Branch. This is an area of Scotland where there are few facilities for LGBT people. The land mass of the Highland branch is the same size as Belgium, with many small rural communities, where LGBT […]

UNISON AND THE REPLACEMENT MEMBERSHIP SYSTEM (RMS)

Conference recognises the importance of identifying UNISON’s disabled membership and their access needs in order to facilitate the participation of disabled members in their union. The RMS is the main recording, mapping and organising tool of the Union at all levels. At the present time the information stored on the RMS with regard to disability […]

TRADE ORGANISATIONS AND DISA BLED PEOPLE

This Conference recognises the great strides made by disabled members self organisation to ensure this union is accessible to disabled members’ participation and involvement and the value of self organisation to help the union meet its rule book commitment to fair representation. We also recognise that much of the Code of Practice that relates to […]

Challenging Racism in the Workplace

Conferences notes that a Labour Research Report from 2001 identified that not all employers were doing all they could to comply with the Race Relations (Amendment) Act 2000. The 2000 Act amended the 1976 Race Relations Act to place a General Duty on all public authorities to promote race equality. Conference notes that the General […]