The UK is facing a future of Water Deficits – Is Re-Nationalisation the only sensible answer?

Conference notes that research for the Adaptation Sub-Committee’s (ASC) 2017 Climate Change Risk Assessment evidence report considered a range of possible scenarios to assess water availability in the UK up to the 2080’s. The research, by consultancy HR Wallingford, considered differing levels of climate change, population growth and efforts to adapt to the impacts of […]

WET e-learning – is it up to the Job?

Quality training and development is important to our members. Yorkshire Water recently closed its training centre in favour of pushing more e-learning onto desktop PCs in the workplace. The list of benefits to WET companies is endless. Massive cost savings are achieved by closing training centres, no course materials, no travel time, less work disruption […]

The role of markets in delivering Water Services

Conference notes that Ofwat in their publication Water 2020 have declared an intention to look to promote markets to deliver services in Water Resources and Bio-resources. Following the collapse of Carillion and the ramifications on public services is it not clear that a ‘markets’ based strategy could have similar devastating consequences for both the public […]

London Housing Crisis

London Housing Crisis: Response to the UNISON Survey Report – No Place To Live – into the impact of Housing costs on London’s public service workers. This conference welcomes the publication in late November 2017 of UNISON’s Report into the impact of Housing costs on London’s public service workers. We are dismayed but not surprised […]

The Push towards Homeworking – ‘Good or Bad’?

Conference is aware that homeworking has increased substantially in recent years and is only going to continue in the future, as sector WET companies continue to cut overheads, save space, encourage flexible working and require an agile workforce. Yorkshire Water are currently encouraging their workforce (office based) to consider working from home at least 1 […]

The push for upper quartile – The ignored impact on employees

As conference will be aware Ofwat is pushing forward it’s vision for the water sector commencing in 2020. A major part of this is to push competition between the water companies harder than before. The phrase ‘upper quartile’ in now bandied about as the place to be and those who are not ‘upper quartile’ will […]

Recruiting and representing disabled members in the WET sector

Conference notes that recruiting new members is a priority for UNISON. Increasing our density in Water, Environment and Transport (WET) will increase our bargaining power with management and help us get the best deal for our members at the negotiating table. Challenges in the WET service group, such as job cuts and TUPE transfers in […]

Flexible working

Conference notes that the right to request flexible working was extended to all employees in 2014. However, the experience of reps and members within the water, environment and transport sector is that many employers are only prepared to agree to flexible working patterns for certain groups of staff, and then only on limited terms. Further, […]

Organising Young Members in the WET Service Group

This WET Conference recognises that young members are the lifeblood of our union and the future within the WET Service Group. We call on the WET SGE in conjunction with the National Young Members Forum and UNISON’s communications department to develop bespoke publicity and materials to retain existing members and recruit current non-members in all […]

Review of safety practices in the Water Industry

This 2018 WET Conference is aware of the disturbing number of accidents/incidents/near misses that continue to occur year on year in the Water Industry. One undeniable root cause is reducing staffing levels to the bare minimum as part of a risk management strategy which must continue to be opposed by UNISON. This Conference calls on […]

Sustainable Water at Work

This Conference calls upon the Water, Environment and Transport Service Group Executive to further develop the excellent “Water at Work” campaign that they launched in 2009, which sought to extend access to drinking water at work from mains supply sources. In order to keep workers healthy at work, we expect that all our employers covered […]

Barred and Advisory Lists

The introduction of the Barred and Advisory lists in December 2017 is yet another attack on police staff and needs to be exposed and, wherever and however possible, challenged. They add to the increasing repertoire of restrictions placed on us as employees of police forces. Further, the impact the legislation could have on those of […]

Pay up now in Community!

Conference notes that UNISON membership in the community service group is increasing and attendance at the community service group meeting at national lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender (LGBT) conference improves annually. Issues affecting LGBT members raised at the meeting include low or no pay increases, attacks on terms and conditions, facility time and bullying, harassment […]

Fair Funding

There is a persistent problem of funding and how contracts are put out for tender. The impact of this is that there is often so little money in the contract that staffing costs are the area employers target to cut back so members end up with larger workloads and lower pay, wages rarely allow for […]

Training and Development for Lay Activists

Conference notes the annual national training event for Community members facilitated by UNISON Learning and Organising Services (LAOS) which took place in Birmingham in October 2017 and its continued success in assisting to develop and empower our membership base. Conference also notes that throughout UNISON nations/regions much innovative work has been undertaken in conjunction with […]