Throughout the pandemic we have seen how important Social Care Workers have been to the country, demonstrating their skills and professionalism, yet most don’t earn the real living wage and many are still on zero hours contracts. As more workers leave the sector, for better pay and recognition of their skills, we need to fight […]
Conference motions
The Community Service Group is very different from others within our union. There are more than eighty thousand members, employed by more than six thousand different employers. More than three thousand members are the only UNISON member at their employer. And most UNISON community members are part of branches where they are in a minority, […]
Conference notes the publication in July 2021 of the Oxford Consultants for Social Inclusion (OCSI) research submitted to the All Party Parliamentary Group (APPG) on Left Behind Neighbourhoods which outlines that those who live in 225 “left behind” neighbourhoods in England receive less than half the charitable grant funding than other deprived places. In this […]
The respected think-tank Institute for Public Policy Research (IPPR) in Autumn 2019 produced a headline “Hospitals face £80bn bill due to toxic PFI Legacy” with a report detailing; 1) Prior to COVID-19, the health service faces a PFI “postcode lottery” as some trusts faced spending up to £1 in every £6 on PFI payments with […]
End Nepotism in the NHS The NHS is meant to be an equal opportunity employer but time and again the best paid jobs go to people well connected or within influence of those in powerful positions. We see jobs going to favourable people who don’t seem to go through any formal interview process and jobs […]
National health service national on call agreement During the negotiations to implement Agenda for Change Unison was the lead union to persuade members and other unions that Agenda for Change would ensure fairness in the workplace. Before Agenda for Change members worked different hours, had different annual leave entitlements, different unsocial hours and different on […]
Conference notes the publication in July 2020 Liverpool City Council’s report in conjunction with UNISON North West, the University of Kent, and the Association of Public Service Excellence (APSE): “Who Cares? Reinventing Adult Social Care” which examines the case for the in-sourcing of social care and adds to the debate around this issue. This report […]
Conference notes the judgement issued by the Supreme Court on 19 March 2021 in the case of Royal Mencap Society v Tomlinson-Blake, which found that care workers employed on sleepover shifts were not entitled to the minimum wage and congratulates UNISON on pursuing this case to the Supreme Court. We believe that this devastating outcome […]
Conference acknowledges the endemic nature of abuse, harassment and violence faced by women on a daily basis. The tragic murders of Sarah Everard, Bibaa Henry Nicole Smallman, Sabina Nessa and many other women in the past year have brought to the forefront the scale of violence against women and reinforced how unsafe many women feel […]
Our Women Members are our greatest asset Conference welcomes the election of Christina McAnea as the first woman General Secretary of a major trade union. Representing more than a million women working across the range of public services, UNISON with its commitment to lay democracy and proportionality and fair representation enshrined within our rule book […]
UNISON can only be the strong, vibrant, effective union it strives to be if Black women are involved and active in every part of its work. Black women are still underrepresented at branch, regional and national level even though UNISON has 1 million women in membership. This is a trend that the National Black Members […]
Conference notes that the 2020 National Women’s Conference passed policy on how women were on a “cliff edge” with respect of to the poverty trap that the need to stay within the thresholds of Universal Credit has created. The pandemic has made this situation much worse. Disabled women are faced with a perfect storm of […]
Research suggests that there may be some variations for Black women in the average age at which the menopause takes place between women of different ethnic backgrounds. Some studies suggest that symptoms may be more prevalent and more severe for Black women, although research is not yet clear on the reasons for this. Black women […]
A Voice for Women Part time Workers Information on UNISON’s website about part-time working states that, ‘Nearly half of UNISON’s members work part-time and the majority of them are women’. Conference this should give these part time women members a loud and clear directive to be included within the very structures of Unison. Not all […]
Conference notes recent advice from the Metropolitan Police force that women should “run away” if they feel unsafe in the presence of a lone police officer in the wake of the murder of Sarah Everard in March 2020. Not only is this advice discriminatory towards disabled women, but it also fails to address the root […]