All the union news that's fit to blog...
A couple of weeks back I stumbled across something quite interesting from a company called Westbourne Communications. It was a blog post detailing their advice to Uber in the “battle with Black Cab drivers” (this is their exact phrasing).
I thought th…Read more…
News of a shareholder resolution filed at National Express calling for a review of workplace rights in its US school bus business Durham. This is the second shareholder resolution backed by unions at a UK PLC this AGM. I don’t think there have been two…Read more…
UK and US union pension funds fear for Pearson PLC business plansSerious concerns about the performance of Pearson PLC, the world’s biggest education publisher, have prompted a trans-Atlantic alliance of pension funds – which includes UNISON’s staff pension fund – to call on the company to review…Read more…
Just to clear up the mystery of those donations tagged to the Conservative Party that I blogged about last year, I’ve had the email below from the Electoral Commission. Basically the Tories mucked up their admin –
Dear Mr Powdrill, You contacted…Read more…
I’ve got a piece up on Left Foot Forward today about workers’ capital as part of #heartunions week. Have a read here.Read more…
Via twitter, I picked up this interesting piece on how Labour’s stance towards business could be made a bit more coherent. I thought I would bung up some thoughts on the points made about infrastructure, and what might be achievable here.
First up, I …Read more…
The TUC’s annual voting survey – its 12th! – is out today. Two things I would flag up – the votes on the shareholder resolution at National Express (a rare case of a res explicitly on labour issues) and the votes on the bonus cap at the banks. Both ind…Read more…
A demonstration has been held outside the Frankfurt office of Macquarie today to protest its failure to resolve ongoing problems at DCT Gdansk (blogged about previously here), where it is the majority owner. Pic of the demo and press statement below……Read more…
Here is Eugene Fama an early paper on agency theory:
ownership of capital should not be confused with owner- ship of the firm. Each factor in a firm is owned by somebody. The firm is just the set of contracts covering the way inputs are joined to …Read more…
I haven’t blogged about the High Pay Centre for quite a while. They have successfully managed to establish themselves as a sort of mirror of the Taxavoiders Alliance, with the same kind of well-evidenced but populist campaigning stance. Which is great …Read more…
I’ve blogged a little previously about what I see as a general failure of labour issues to make it very high up the ESG agenda. As someone who has worked with and for trade unions in different ways for much of my adult life I find this frustrating, par…Read more…
Looking at the Electoral Commission register of party political donations I can see that there are a number made by someone called Simon M Haslam. This name also turns up in the register of interests for the current Secretary of State for Transport. If…Read more…
Ahh…. Fidelity, the lure of right-wing British politics is just too strong for you isn’t it?
I’ve blogged previously about the latest Fidelity link to the Tories – their involvement with the Leaders Group. According to the Conservative Party’s own we…Read more…
Via Chris Dillow, I picked up this speech by Liam Byrne. It’s interesting to read someone who obviously disagrees with Jeremy Corbyn try and come to terms with the new centre of gravity in Labour. It’s worth noting, too, he uses the term “neo-liberalis…Read more…
Just keeping this one warm. As it stands, the Electoral Commission register of donations continues to list two donations from Caledonia Investments PLC worth £4000 in the financial year to 31 March 2015. As previously noted these were not disclosed in the company’s annual report and were not…Read more…
I’ve blogged on an off over the years about behavioural economics and what lefties can usefully learn from it. It seems like the surge of interest on the Left in the UK in this area has subsided a bit compared to a few years back. But I’m sure the same…Read more…
There is a fantastic quote from the Taxpayers’ Alliance in this BBC story about Facebook that makes explicit the trouble they have as a “taxpayer” body commenting on this issue.
“Taxpayers will be justifiably confused and angry about this tax bill. Bu…Read more…
Even since I blogged earlier things have got worse for Sports Direct. The Grauniad broke the news that the company’s chief executive Dave Forsey is facing a criminal charge over the USC collapse.
David Forsey, the chief executive of Sports Direct, has …Read more…
Sports Direct is back in the news, for all the wrong reasons. This week alone we have seen the following:
A BBC documentary revealed that ambulances were called to Shirebrook dozens of times in 2013 and 2014 because of employee illness. Some of t…Read more…
Blurb below from Osborne’s conference speech today. Directly linked to infrastructure investment, not sure if the intention is to invest back in the local region, which might raise a few issues…
At the moment, we have 89 different local government p…Read more…