Conference welcomes the publication of Time to Care, UNISON’s Report into home care and an Ethical Care Charter for commissioning home care which sets out the following principles: 1. Visits shall be based on client need and appropriate care will be provided. Time allocated will match need and 15 minutes will not generally be appropriate […]
Conference motions
Conference notes with concern the lack of reviewing of the age of the older population when Travel Insurance is required. Insurance companies take no consideration for anyone becoming “over 70 years of age” and premiums are increased on age alone. Government policy on retirement age is to increase the age of retirement. Therefore we instruct […]
Conference acknowledges that after the narrow defeat on a card vote of motion 32 at last year’s conference the issue of the structure of Retired Members Conference needs to be looked at in more depth. In recent years Conference has allowed more time for debate of motions at the beginning of the agenda often to […]
Homecare workers are personally propping up a deteriorating system of adult social care but are being pushed to breaking point. That they are still willing to deliver good levels of care in spite of the system is nothing short of heroic. For the system to work it needs to be underpinned by adequate funding and […]
Conference notes that the National Executive Council has submitted several rule changes to National Delegate Conference including one on adequate and agreed funding for retired member activity. Conference also notes the existence of Regional Pools. These Regional Pools are intended to be an additional source of branch funding for specific items where the branch could […]
Conference notes that the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence (NICE) has rejected a proposal from the Department of Health that its assessment of new medicines should include the evaluation of wider societal benefit (WSB). Wider Societal Benefit is a measure of the impact of a treatment on the extent to which people living […]
Add at end of Standing Order 3.1 A regional delegate may move a motion or amendment submitted by a Branch within that Region if the Branch concerned is unable to be present at the Conference. Delete existing 3.3 Renumber 3.4 as 3.3.
At Conference just last year UNISON attacked the government’s obsession with sickness rates, after figures released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS) showed that days lost due to sickness absence fell from 178 million in 1993 to 131 million in 2013. The figures also showed that the differences in absence rates between the public […]
Conference notes that the proposals in the Government’s Pensions Bill – self-praised by them as a way of making the state pensions system clearer and fairer – do neither of these things, do nothing for existing pensioners, and would result in a multi-tier pensions system so complicated that not only pensioners but probably even those […]
Conference has on several occasions made policies regarding our determination to hang on to the small (but valuable and much valued) universal benefits elderly people have such as bus passes, free TV licenses etc. We must now recognise that there is yet another political threat to these: leading UKIP figures have made no secret of […]
Conference recognises that as we get older, medically more things are prone to go wrong. Fortunately, both well established and new drugs can be prescribed which assist in the management of acute and chronic conditions in older people. We can continue to lead active, useful and interesting lives long after our parents would have succumbed […]
Conference is very concerned that the Basic State Pension (BSP) has remained below the poverty level for many years. In April 2014, it was increased to £113.10 per week for a single pensioner, a rise of £2.95 per week. The National Pensioners Convention statistic for the poverty level is £175. The deficit of £64.90 is […]
This Conference notes with concern that retired people who are not on line and are unable to access the internet can be significantly disadvantaged both economically and socially. They are unable to take advantage of deals on, for example, fuel and transport and are deprived of services that are accessible solely on line. They are […]
Conference recalls that caucuses for black members, disabled members, lesbian, gay, bisexual & transgender members and women members were introduced to the programme of this conference in 2009. Conference confirms that the caucuses make a valuable contribution to the conference but believes their arrangements could be improved. Conference therefore instructs the National Retired Members’ Committee […]
Conference recognises that one of the factors to account for the growth of UNISON’s Retired Members’ Organisation is growing longevity. While this mainly consists of existing members growing older there are also instances of former members taking up retired membership many years after they left work. Conference asserts that longevity is an asset not a […]