Conference notes that the decision to end the system of support for local Council Tax payers has: 1)Resulted in chaos, with different households in identical circumstances receiving different levels of support simply because of where they live 2)Resulted in inefficiency with increased costs of collection, higher bad debt provision and the prospect of more people […]
Conference motions
This Conference notes the risk to the lives, health and welfare of local government staff posed by Government’s attacks on the health and safety regulatory system. These attacks include: 1)The cuts in local authority inspection – by 86% since 2009/10 2) The dumbing down of Health and Safety Executive (HSE) advice, including its guidance on […]
Conference deplores the scale of the austerity cuts and the damage they are wreaking on local services and our members who work in them. Despite the high profile failures of privatised services, councils continue to outsource services to private sector organisations – either through ideology or because they believe the bogus claims that the private […]
This Conference notes that the recession is impacting on jobs in the public sector: full time permanent jobs are disappearing at an alarming rate as Councils and other public sector agencies deal with the impact of reducing budgets. Support is confirmed for UNISON policies aimed at resisting attacks on our members’ jobs, pay and service […]
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 […]
Local Government Conference 2013 LGPS Full Voting Rights for Union Nominated Representatives Conference through the ongoing governance negotiations we must ensure that we achieve full membership and voting rights for Unison nominated LGPS representatives to local Pension Panel boards. The 1989 Local Government Housing Act, section 13, gives union representative full membership participation. With 4,600,000 […]
This Conference reaffirms its belief that effective regulation of health and social care services is essential given the ongoing attacks on the NHS and the continuing cuts to social care budgets. The Care Quality Commission (CQC) which provides this vital service is being asked to expand its regulatory role significantly whilst simultaneously undergoing a period […]
Conference notes that the Education and Training Standards Committee (ETS) of the National Youth Agency is consulting on the establishment of an Institute for Youth Work (IYW) for England. This includes the possibility of potential later extension to include the whole UK. The IYW is to be open to employees and volunteers working with young […]
Conference deplores the continuing cuts to youth services in the statutory and voluntary sectors. Much of the infrastructure is disappearing fast with 100% cuts to services being common. The workforce is facing major redundancies and those workers who survive the onslaught are facing attacks on their pay and conditions. Conference therefore congratulates those branches who […]
Further education colleges walk a tightrope of financial uncertainty, policy upheaval and erratic management. Even in the years when funding increased, it was no guarantee against cuts and redundancies in the sector. Since the coalition government came to power, education funding across the UK has been reduced at the fastest rate for fifty years. Next […]
This Conference condemns the action of the Association of Colleges (AoC) in withdrawing from the national Joint Agreement on Guidelines on Sick Leave in Further Education Colleges, which was agreed in 2000. The action was taken in the face of strong opposition by the trade union side and against a background of falling sickness absence […]
Conference notes: 1)The impact of savage spending cuts in Local Government 2)The ongoing attacks on council services and the most vulnerable in our society by the Conservative led Government 3)The importance of UNISON fighting these cuts both locally and nationally 4)The importance of local branch knowledge in understanding the financial and budget setting decisions made […]
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 […]
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 […]
Conference reiterates our condemnation, expressed by this Conference in 2012 of the Conservative-led coalition for the widespread and unprecedented destruction of council services that has resulted from the savage and unprecedented reductions in central government grants to local authorities and fire authorities and to the devolved nations. Local government workers have borne the brunt of […]