UNISON calling

Conference welcomes the UNISON call centre charter, launched in 2012, 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. This includes ensuring that staff are able to take sufficient breaks away from the workstation […]

Attacks on facility time

Conference is concerned at this government’s concerted attacks on trade union facility time in the public sector. The United Kingdom has a proud tradition of progressing industrial relations through a joint approach with trade unions. Public sector employers recognise the worth of allocating facility time as a means of supporting trade union activists to fulfil […]

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 has a majority of women members we do not just talk the talk. Women are […]

Demise of the state education system

Conference believes that this government is intent on dismantling state education in the same way they are dismantling our National Health Service. The views of support staff, parents and teachers are being ignored whilst the Coalition government’s Secretary of State for Education, Michael Gove, arrogantly decides that he has the freedom to overturn 150 years […]

Palestine

Conference reaffirms UNISON’s existing policy on Palestine with the following principal aims: 1)Israel to withdraw to the borders of 5 June 1967, demolish its Apartheid wall and remove all its settlements; 2)the right of Palestinians to establish a state in the West Bank and the Gaza Strip with its capital at Jerusalem; and, 3)the Palestinian […]

Affordable, safe, adequate, secure housing for all

Conference notes: 1)that the housing policies of the Tory led coalition government is leading to the cleansing of ordinary working people from London and other areas of high rents across the country; 2)this process was started by a local area housing allowance benefit cap which deliberately ignored actual rent levels. While the imposition of a […]

Solidarity with Nicaragua

UNISON notes the long standing friendship between UNISON and UNE, the Nicaraguan Public Service Trade Union, and the strengthening of that relationship in recent years. It also applauds the progress made by the Sandinista government since being elected in 2007 towards social and economic justice in Nicaragua. In the present harsh climate for trade unions […]

A National Health Service means no to postcode pay

Conference notes with concern and anger the threat to health workers, their families, patients, communities and our National Health Service that has been represented by the Pay Cartel in the South West (aka the Pay Consortium). Conference further notes the ongoing threat posed by NHS Employers across the country who unilaterally or in collaboration with […]

Call Centre Working Time

UNISON welcomed the publication of the new call centre charter, launched last year by Professor Charlotte Rainer (report author) of Portsmouth University at this conference. The continued and disproportionate levels of workplace stress, bullying and harassment which in turn leads to a higher than average level of sickness absence, is a big concern. An increasing […]

Regional and local pay threats

Conference notes with concern the continued attempts by the Coalition government at Westminster to break up national pay bargaining in the public services with attempts to introduce local and regional pay. Conference welcomes the fact that active campaigning has deterred some of the immediate threats through the pay review body system but threats remain, not […]

Welfare cuts

The Coalition government’s attempt to cut billions from the welfare budget will have a devastating impact on low income households across the UK in the period ahead and in so doing, create a divided society in which Victorian themes of the deserving and undeserving poor are used. Conference notes in particular that: 1) the provisions […]

Employment and trade union rights

Conference is angry at the Coalition government’s continued attacks on individual and trade union employment rights that have been stepped up this year and calls on the National Executive Council to lead a campaign to reverse policies that have laid waste to our economy, our public services and the living standards of our members since […]

NHS and social care integration

Conference condemns the failure of political leaders to grasp the nettle and implement a long-term sustainable solution to the funding deficit in social care. The numbers of people who need social care and support are continuing to rise as a result of the ageing population and medical advances which have improved life expectancy. But the […]

Alternatives to austerity

Conference finds no joy in being proved right that the Coalitions austerity programme continues to cause a slump. Final UK growth is forecast by the Chancellor for minus 0.1 percent in 2012 and optimistically for 1.2% in 2013. The Quantitative Easing scheme run by Bank of England has propped up the financial firms with cheap […]

Outsourcing and privatisation

Conference condemns moves by the coalition government to encourage greater use of outsourcing and privatisation in the delivery of public services. In doing so governments have ignored the impact of this US style approach which includes: 1) increased inequality in access and delivery of public services; 2) fragmentation of services, confusion for service users and […]