Building Solidarity Against th e Cuts
2011 Solidarity donation £1
Fight for the Future
Unemployment above 2.5 million, inflation at 4.5% and a stagnant economy are together causing real crisis for millions of working class families. But things are about to get far worse. A total of £18 billion in cuts to welfare benefits have yet to hit. Tax credit cuts are leaving families £30 a week worse-off, benefits to more than 1.5 million people with disabilities are being cut, eligibility for housing benefit is capped, and pensions are being reduced by an average of 11% as the calculation is moved from RPI to CPI*. And half-amillion public sector job cuts
Rich getting Richer Meanwhile, oil companies announce record profits, with Shell alone bragging of £4,400,000,000 profit in the first three months of this year. Petrol prices stay sky high, raising food prices and transport costs.
June 30th!
Banks Then there’s the banks. We, the people who pay tax, paid tens of billions of pounds to bail them out. Tens of thousands of bank workers have lost their jobs, whilst bank profits grow. Lloyds, 41% owned by us, the tax-payers, has made profits of £1 billion for the past half-year, despite writing-off £6.6bn of “bad debts”. Lloyds own a third of all UK mortgages, and are profiting out of the 40,000 homerepossessions this year. But the banks are not being stopped from continuing the speculation that caused the 2008 crash. Meanwhile, the suffering is increasing. Plymouth Trades Union Council is building co-ordinated action against deep social injustice.
THE ALTERNATIVE:
Strikes and Protests Make it a Day of Action against Cuts March Against the Cuts! 12 Midday Rally at the Guildhall, 1pm Join the Picket lines Raise support in your workplace and neighbourhood Sign the Petition agaisnt the Cuts
Jobs! Growth! www.plymouth-tuc.org.uk Justice! Trade Unions for a Sustainable Future
*For more on CPI and RPI, see centre pages
Stop Privatisation - Keep Our National Health Service Public The new NHS bill lays the legal foundations for the privatisation of the NHS, writes Sue Franklin, PTUC Publicity Officer. Health Secretary Andrew Lansley is acting with lightning speed, dismantling bits of the health service even before the bill becomes law. The Health & Social Care Bill states that no NHS body will be allowed to be overspend. So the next part of the jigsaw becomes clear. As £20billion of cuts hit our Health Services, GP commissioning groups will start to fail financially. And as they do, private sector companies will be ready to move from a support role to taking on the whole budget themselves. The Bill will mean the privatisation of NHS hospitals and community services. No longer will NHS organisations be “preferred providers”—the catchphrase is “any willing provider”.
Marketisation And the new NHS market regulator, Monitor, will step to adjudicate if any private hospital company complains that they were not given the opportunity to bid for NHS contracts.
Pay Cuts Hospitals will be allowed to compete on price, with one hospital vying to undercut the next. And the management of any hospital that fails financially can be taken over by the private sector. Gone will be NHS national pay and negotiations, with the new Foundation Trusts free to set their own pay scales. Pensions too will be under threat. Couple this with “personal budgets” forced on patients with long-term conditions. We will end up with a two-tier NHS, with richer patients topping up their NHS care privately, just as already happens in NHS dentistry.
The transfer of community health services to Social Enterprise is a slow-burn journey to a private health service. On 17th March, managers in Plymouth agreed the transfer of our community health services to Sentinel.
Privatisation by any other name £80,000,000,000 is to be transferred to GPs from April, to “purchase” the health care they think we need. In Plymouth, the GPs consortium, Sentinel will take over, as a notfor-profit organisation. But wait. What are profits? Profit is the amount of money that a service produces, after paying for costs of staff and resources. So if the GP’s pay themselves £120,000 a year each, plus dividends, that doesn’t go on the profit line. If they “commission” services from the many US-based private medical firms lining-up to make a killing out of our health needs, their profits don’t show-up on Sentinel’s surplus line.
Profit The profit is hidden, but very much there. Profit is the hallmark of privatisation. Private businesses charge the tax-payer more to provide a service than public non-profit services ever cost. Think of the price-rises by privatised services over the past 30 years: * Water * Gas * Electricity
The end of National Insurance - Why? The National Insurance contributions paid by all working people include money specifically allocated to the National Health Service. specifically for our Health Service, our pensions and our welfare benefits.
In the March 2011 Budget, the Chancellor announced a consultation on the operational integration of the NI contributions and income tax systems. Why? If you are to privatise the NHS and start charging for Health Services, you cannot have people seeing their monthly payments identified in their pay packets. “Integrating” the tax systems stops us being reminded that we pay
No Protection NI contirbutions amount to £90billion - 17% of annual government receipts. The link between paying NI contributions and right to benefits has been weakened - now they’re trying to end it. Today, NI payments cannot be used for general government spending. But after “integration”, where will our money go?
Plymouth
Hidden
Thanks to Steve Bell for the cartoon All Rights Reserved
* Railways * Bus transport * Waste disposal In fact, the history of privatisation is not just about profit. It is also about social control. It is the history of taking every necessity of life out of the collective ownership and democratic control of us all and into the hands of a few super-rich who ration and deny us our needs unless we can pay over the true cost. Privatisation fragments coordination of services, forces competition to cut the unit cost of care, hikes
productivity and forces down workers wages. In the NHS, everyone knows that “lean” working means working your buttoff for less pay. The Government is set to spend £1.7billion on “restructuring” the NHS, calling it “Liberating the NHS”. Yes, the private health companies are being given legal rights to liberate the assets of the National Health Service that working people paid for, owned and enjoyed for generations. They must be stopped by popular protest and coordinated strike action.
www.keepournhspublic.com
Cuts Hurt Women Workers Most of all Recent employment figures show a rise up to 2.5 million people now unemployed, writes Sarah Allen-Melvin, PTUC Vice Chair. Analysis by the TUC shows that unemployment rates among young women have risen much faster than men over the past two years, and could get far worse. Saga’s latest research shows the number of job losses for women over 50 has started rising again. The ConDem cuts are now seeing dramatic reductions in services and changes to welfare benefits and tax that will force women back into the home as carers of elderly relatives and children, and at the same time reduce their income as a punishment for not working. This is a gross social injustice.
4.5% inflation, tax increases, and cuts to pay and benefits reduce workers’ spending power by 15% Sell-off of public services puts lives and welfare at risk Oil price hikes increase inflation Existing benefit cuts mean that 18 million households will be at least £1,000 worse off each year. Cuts in child tax credits from April see half a million lose some £440 a year.
Condemn Child Poverty More than one in five (about 10,000) children, are living in poverty in Plymouth, admits Plymouth’s Tory-led Council. Their plan is to cut Plymouth’s poverty by half by 2020, but research shows that child poverty is to rise in Plymouth until at least 2015. The spending cuts, including cuts to tansport for disabled children, and more than £2.5 million from the Council’s Children and families budget, including cuts to Children’s Centres, are likely to make matters worse.
Trade Unions for a Sustainable Future
The OECD Report* published in April explained that “sustained early years investment is needed to meet the UK’s child poverty targets”.
Come to the Tolpuddle march and Rally Tolpuddle Village, Dorset. Sunday 17th July. Coaches from Plymouth £10 return all-in. More information, and to book via PayPal go to www.plymouth-tuc.org.uk BRING BANNERS AND FLAGS! Cuts to services and welfare benefits, tax-hikes, rising inflation and interest rate rises are set to make matters worse, not better. With a million under-25’s out of work, student fees of £9,000 a year preventJoin Us: ing access to higher Plymouth Fightback Against the Cuts education, and cuts to services for vulnerable children and young people, the Government is @PlymouthTUC letting down a whole generation. The fight against cuts is a Phone or text: 07803 620390 fight for our children’s www.plymouth-tuc.org.uk future. * The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) report can be accessed at: www.oecd.org/social/family/ doingbetter
PO Box 378 Plymouth PL1 9BN
Inflation rise 'won't help cut jobless'
www.plymouth-tuc.org.uk
This is a fight for the Survival of the Welfare State 5 Council Lobbies 7 City Centre marches 8 flash protests 10 public meetings 11 coaches to the 26th March TUC National Demonstration Weekly campaign stalls Anti-cuts Petition links unions with community campaigners We’ve only just begun!
Plymouth relies on public services more than most cities. Historic lack of investment by the private sector has left Plymouth isolated and economically vulnerable, writes Tony Staunton, Secretary of Plymouth TUC. So the 28% cut to public sector services and jobs by 2014 is a major blow to any hopes for a brighter future. And most of the pain is coming in 2011, with terrible job cuts and attacks on pay rates, conditions of service and pension rights.
cutting jobs and services. Shops are closing down every week, building workers sacked and factories shedding their workforce month-by-month.
Rising inflation will hinder attempts to tackle unemployment, Government ministers have admitted, as figures show a marked increase in Plymouth's jobless total. The number of people claiming dole in the city was 6,741 in March 2011, and rising. A third of those out of work in Plymouth are aged 1824, higher than the national average of 28%.
Unions consider 30th June Co-ordinated Strike Action
The National Union of Teachers is leading the call for co-ordinated industrial United Front action to defend pensions. Plymouth Trades Union The UCU and PCS unions Council re-launched have already declared their Plymouth Fightback readiness to ballot. Health Against the Cuts in August workers in Unite are talking 2010, and has brought about co-ordinated action. together students, workThese unions are comitted ers, pensioners groups, to industrial action to claimants campaigns, prevent workers having to local politicians, trade pay more every month, and unionists and work much longer to community groups in receive less in pension common cause to fight pay-outs. against all the cuts. This issue is getting more Whatever your particualr bitter as inflation and the issue, the cuts to local More than 400 jobs are two-year pay freeze bite. jobs and services, pay being lost at Derriford Current public sector Hospital, let alone the fall- and conditions threatens pension schemes are not out after transfer of the short of funds and are the medium term hopes Community Health Trust in for our city, and we must affordable. The higher April. contributions are a new tax. join in a united front to 500 more jobs are to go at stop the cuts and fight for This is a simple class Plymouth City Council and attack on the very existmore at Princess Yachts and every job! ence of a decent public the airport. As predicted, sector, final-salary the privatised CityBus are pension scheme.
Plymouth-tuc.org.uk
Half-a-Million on TUC March Against Cuts!
2. The rich are getting richer The wealth of the 1,000 richest people in Britain stands at a record £336 billion, according to the Sunday Times rich list. It went up by an incredible £77 billion last year. Why not tax that instead of cutting jobs and services?
3. Tax dodges of the wealthy
The largest protest by trades unions in over 70 years! We wage slaves are revolting! The movement against the cuts is growing fast. Just consider that each one of the half-a-million returned to their workplaces and neighbourhoods stronger and more resolved to fight, knowing that we are not alone, isolated or in the minority. The vast majority of ordinary working people are against the cuts. But Britain is divided, more and more polarised between the rich and the poor. The media is owned by some of the richest taxdodgers in the world. Little wonder they played-down the demonstration.
13 more Reasons to Fight the Cuts! 1. 162,000 council job cuts and 52,000 Health Service jobs to go The proposed council job losses total currently stands at 162,718, according to the GMB union. The TUC published research showing at least 52,000 NHS jobs will be cut this year.
‘
The strike busters: Secret plans drawn up to tackle out By Tim Shipman threat of a mass walk awn up by
11 has been dr s 22nd February 20 neral strike d up to cros prevent a ge orkers line
busting w ar plan’ to ffice to A secret ‘w h thousands of union- t up in the Cabinet O it blic sector se w pu – en s rs be as te s m minis s. A unit ha e event of th ne li in et ll ti ck ds pi militant ng to a stan kers are tain grindi strike brea prevent Bri ensure that pots such to ’ ts es ho m s. gy ga ut er walko ucted ‘war ube and en T nd e en co th be ve as ve ha bosses ha lities such Officials n vital faci managers and prison cross ru to to s e er bl ag la avai nsport ams of man ations. Tra rial action. kers and te as power st a er of indust agency wor m se m ni su ga e id or g Britain to w ordered to ning to brin of a nation s an ar pl fe e ar id es s am t union boss the public services. picket line e lieve militan analysed th hout Ministers be nated strikes throug Maude has is he T nc ra d. F se r di te ba or inis are halt with co et Office M t militant union staff ulate n by Cabin os tempt to em at s n’ The unit, ru ork out where the m io it al . co 84 e 19 th w e in to ar ers’ strike t secrecy, workforce d of the min t to keep every up in utmos ea n ah aw ns dr io s, plan eparat difficul hatcher’s pr would be extremely kes. Margaret T s it dinated stri ou or ci co ns of co t e en ar ev rs e te th is in in M ing ice function ‘Nuff Said public serv
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The rich already avoid or evade £120 billion a year of tax, according to the PCS civil service workers’ union. Barclays Bank paid less than 2.5% tax on their £6.2billion profit this year, whilst workers pay between 25 and 33%. Companies such as Vodafone and Topshop use legal tax dodges to get out of paying their way. Tax the Rich!
4. Bosses’ obscene and growing pay The bosses of the FTSE 100 top companies paid themselves an average of £4.9 million last year.Bart Becht of Reckitt Benckiser, Britain’s highest paid chief executive, pocketed £92.6 million—more than 3,000 workers at the firm put together
inflation measure to the lower CPI rate. This means the average public sector worker will see the amount paid into their pension fall from £7,250 a year to just £4,750. But the government has even worse plans lined up. Its pensions review is also looking at raising workers’ contribution rates—effectively a pay cut. And the pension age is rising more quickly to 66. If you’re male and under 40, you’ll have to work until you’re at least 68
9. Cuts discriminate Services dedicated to women, LGBT people, black and Asian people and people with disabilities have been some of the first to go in the cuts. These groups also make up a higher proportion of workers in the public sector, and so are more likely to lose their jobs. In Plymouth and Devon, services for people suffering Domestic Abuse have been slashed by at least 40%.
10. Plans to ban strikes
The war in Afghanistan costs Britain £4.5 billion a year, let alone the cost of casualties bring the troops home now! www.stopwar.org.uk
The Tories are threatening to make the already draconian anti-union laws even harsher by requiring minimum turnouts before strike ballots are valid— and to make it legal to sack anyone on the spot who has been employed for less than two years
6. Stop the war on the poor
11. Health and safety cuts kill
The Tories are forcing unemployed people into unpaid work. And they have brought in harsh testing for disability benefits. Private contractor Atos has declared people with severe disabilities as “fit to work”, which has thrown them off badlyneeded benefits
The Tories’ plan to deal with 50,000 work-related deaths a year, according to TUC figures, is to slash the number of health and safety inspections.
5. Billions spent on killing and dying
7. Fight to save our nurseries In Manchester, the cuts mean the council is closing every SureStart nursery unless “volunteers” can be found to run them. This could soon happen everywhere. In Plymouth, Children’s Centres are currently “out to tender”.
8. Pensions slashed Up to five million public sector workers will work for longer and pay more in contributions, and end up with lower pensions at the end of it. The government is already playing the trick of changing the rate they increase at from RPI
12. Academy Schools All the talk about parents and community groups running schools is a Trojan horse for handing over control of education to business groups and privateers, costing parents more for less for their children. www.antiacademies.org.uk
13. Royal Mail privatisation Not even Margaret Thatcher dared to sell Royal Mail—but the coalition has private mail firms lined up to take it over. Leading bidder TNT closed all its own post offices in the Netherlands two years ago - go to:
www.cwu.org
Plymouth Unions
Save Our Bus Services Plymouth SOBS
News in Brief Day Care Cuts THE Welby respite unit for people with learning disabilities closed on March 31, with no alternative resource. Colwill Lodge is due to be extended, but work has not started and is anticipated to take seven months to complete. This facility will only available for the minority of people who use Welby, and those who are able to use it will have no respite for several months. Prime Minister David Cameron recently stated that councils were given an extra £8million to fund respite care. This figure was not ring fenced, so where is this money being used in Plymouth?
Defence Jobs success
www.campaigncc.org
Plymouth Trades Union Council believes that catastrophic climate change is the greatest threat to the future of humanity and the environment. There is no doubt that Climate Change is with us, as extreme weather conditions across the world have proven in the past few months. Governments are doing little or nothing to address the scale of the challenge to dramatically reduce emissions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases quickly. The ConDem Coalition has cut £40billion of investments earmarked for
green energy production and green jobs. We support the call for the Marine Energy Park at South Yard of Devonport Dockyard. and the Campaign against Climate Change campaign for investment in 1 million green Jobs to reflate the economy and reduce energy emissions. Buy the pamphlet at:
www.bookmarksbookshop.co.uk
October's defence review announced 8% cuts to military spending by 2014, set against 28% cuts to the City’s council services. The Review honoured the contract for two aircraft carriers and spared HMS Ocean at an estimated cost of £7 billion. Follwoing a huge public campaign against these cuts last Autumn, the Government has declared committment to keeping the frigates in Plymouth, as well as the replacement of the Trident nuclear weapons programme, currently costing £2.2billion a year.
Just as we predicted when we supported the Unite trade union campaign against the sell-off of our public buses last year, the private company is cutting jobs and services, putting profit before public need, writes Dave Franklin, Chair of PTUC. PLYMOUTH Citybus is axing 'loss-making' routes in the latest round of public transport cuts. Angry residents have slammed changes as "diabolical" while others said elderly and vulnerable people are being left trapped in their homes. Citybus bosses said the withdrawal of five services and changes to a further six are "frustrating" but necessary to protect drivers' jobs and the network's future. The company is also considering a general fare increase, and has placed driver recruitment on hold. Plymouth Trades Union Council support the Plymouth Campaign: “Save Our Bus Services” and will work closely with local neighbourhood campaigns and the Plymouth Transitions Group, whose Sustainable Transport Plan, Smiley Transport, was endorsed by PTUC last year.
No Divide-and-Rule Unite Against Fascism
Len McCluskey, leader of Britain’s biggest union, Unite, is a leading signature to the petition opposing David Cameron’s atack
on multiculturalism, writes Hayley Kemp, PTUC. He is joined by MP John McDonnell, Aaron Porter president of the NUS, TSSA general secretary Gerry Doherty, Dilowar Khan, the executive director of East London Mosque and London Muslim Centre
and London Assembly member Murad Qureshi, along with local councillors, campaigners, artists and thousands of others. The petition was launched after Cameron’s attack on multiculturalism and Britain’s Muslims sparked outrage.
Sign the statement on-line at
www.gopetition.com/petitions/defend-multiculturalism.html
lovemusichateracism.com David Cameron feels support draining away and he’s fighting back by sinking into the politics of the racist gutter—with a speech scapegoating immigrants. He wants us to blame each other for the crisis, rather than the rich. Immigration had nothing to do with creating the crisis. But if people blame migrants it will allow the Tories to continue their attacks without resistance.
Destabilising Cameron says that large scale immigration is a problem because it destabilises Britain’s communities. But apparently having a library, hospital or swimming pool closed has no such effect. It is
the Government that is making £86 billion of cuts, not immigrants! And he can’t get away from the fact that most people who arrive in Britain come from within the EU or as students.
Divide & Rule The prime Minister used his latest speech during the April local government elections to also attack people on welfare: “Migrants are filling gaps in the labour market left wide open by a welfare system that for years has paid British people not to work.” For him, it would appear, any poor person on benefits is a scrounger. This cynical speech is enough to give confidence to the racists and to try to divide workers in order to divert attention from the true cause of the Cuts - banker’s
uaf.org.uk greed and non-payment of taxes by the superrich. The problem is that these lies about migration can take hold. A recent poll for the Refugee Council showed that most people “wildly overestimated” the numbers of refugees in Britain. Nearly half thought that 100,000 were accepted in 2009. The true figure was 4,175.
Unity is Strength Despite this discrepancy, the survey found that a large majority of people were sympathetic to those fleeing persecution to seek protection. We can stop Cameron’s filth by countering his lies and pointing to the real cause of poverty and unemployment private profit.
Mark Serwotka General Secretary, Civil Service union Cameron wants to return us to a time before anti-racism— when other cultures were regarded as second class. This is just the latest despicable attack on Muslim people. But this is also an attack on us all. His words were deliberately chosen to cause division, at exactly the time when people in our communities the length and breadth of the country are uniting. Instead of addressing the genuine concerns of working class people of all cultures, faiths and skin colours, Cameron is seeking to scapegoat minorities. I, and my union, stand for solidarity. We support multiculturalism for the same reasons that we oppose the government’s devastating plans to slash public services and spending. These are the things that bind us together and we must not let Cameron, the far right or anyone else drive us apart.
Billy Hayes General secretary, Postal Workers union There is a real danger that Cameron will give every racist a licence to intimidate Muslims. I welcome the response of Unite Against Fascism, Love Music Hate Racism, and One Society Many Cultures, to challenge him. In the unions we must ensure our members and activists are alert to the increased potential for attacks upon Muslims, inside the workplace and the community.
Kanja Ibrahim Sesay NUS Black Students’ Officer Cameron’s flawed concept of the big society is that it appears to include everyone but the Muslim community. Multiculturalism is part of British life. It leads to a more integrated society that promotes social cohesion based on being nformed and respectful. We must continue to celebrate it and do all we can to promote it. We can create a more inclusive society, which will defeat extremism and fascism.
Plymouth Trades Union Council Plymouth Trades Union Council comprises delegates from 14 trade union branches in Plymouth with a combined membership of 18,000 workers in the City and surrounding area. We offer support, solidarity and an action network between workers, pensioners, students and claimants across Plymouth, and link with progressive campaigns in the community, with the intention of helping develop a mutually beneficial and sustainable future for the people of Plymouth. Plymouth Trades Union Council is affiliated to the Trades Union Congress (TUC) nationally. Why not Join Us? www.plymouth-tuc.org.uk Secretary: Tony Staunton Assistant Secretary: Diana Beal Chair: Dave Franklin Vice Chair: Sarah Allen-Melvin President: Paddy Ryan
More Information: Plymouth Trades Union Council supports:
www.antiacademies.org.uk www.thepeoplescharter.org www.defendcouncilhousing.org.uk www.stopwar.org.uk www.amnesty.org.uk www.tuc.org.uk//economy/ tuc-18115-f0.cfm www.campaigncc.org www.righttowork.org.uk Buy the new Pamphlet: “Defending the Welfare State” at www.righttowork.org.uk
Plymouth Trades Union Council PO Box 378, Plymouth PL1 9BN Phone or Text 07803 620390 Support Fightback, printed quarterly:
www.plymouth-tuc.org.uk Thanks to Steve Bell for the cartoon All Rights Reserved
80 metre chimney stack, lorries and toxic fumes
NO INCINERATOR! RESIDENTS in Barne Barton, St Budeaux and Weston Mill have been fighting controversial plans for a waste incinerator on Devonport Dockyard land. Plymouth Trades Union Council have offered support since more than 100 people launched the campaign at a public meeting in February 2010. Set up to oppose the plans for the Incinerator, the IIW are angry about MVV Umwelt's proposal to build an Energy From Waste (EfW) Incinerator plant on a plot in Devonport's North Yard. 4 major protests marches in the City, and lobbies of Plymouth Councillors have raised issues of toxic fumes, 120 lorries a day past primary schools, and the lack of democratic accountability in the process of deciding a £1.5billion Private Finance Initiative contract tying Plymouth to hefty repayments for 25 years. The scheme is an attack on working class communities and the council tax payer, and must be stopped.
IIW c/o PO Box 378, Plymouth PL1 9BN 07722 140726 www.iiw.org.uk
Trade Unions call for an end to War on Libya Unite the union, UNISON, the Scottish Trade Union Congress and the Plymouth Trades Union Council are leading growing concern about the NATO military intervention in Libya. The statement from Unite sums-up the issue: Unite the Union believes the attack on Libya by British, French and US forces is wrong and should be halted. While holding no brief for Colonel Gaddafi and his regime, and strongly supporting the movements now developing for democracy and freedom across the Arab world, Unite believes the present military intervention is a mistake because: It risks killing Libyan civilians while doing nothing to end hostilities on the ground. It prolongs a civil conflict when what is needed is a ceasefire followed by mediation. It raises the possibility of escalation leading to military occupation of all or part of Libya, when similar occupations in Iraq and Afghanistan have shown how disastrous and counter-productive such interventions are. This could lead to a wider war in the region. The action has little or no Arab involvement, and is opposed by, amongst others, Russia, China and India, leaving it dependent on those western powers whose policies have aroused deep hostility throughout the Middle East. It stands in contrast to the indulgence shown by the government to the autocrats in Bahrain, Saudi Arabia and elsewhere who have been allowed to repress movements for democracy in their own countries with impunity. We urge the British government to think again, call a halt to the military action and urge a general ceasefire to be followed by international mediation. More info: www.stopwar.org.uk