If anybody is thinking of sitting out the local council elections, I sincerely urge you to think again. May 5 is the first opportunity we voters have to send a message that we are fed up with…Read more…
Cash savings are really struggling
At the end of March the ONS released their latest Quarterly national accounts. The stats indicated that household savings are at a fifty year low. A new figure released today indicates that savings are lower than even the March figures implied. The national accounts ratio indicates the amount…Read more…
Think again
Talks between Unite and Unipres have broken down at the automotive company’s facility in Sunderland over proposed changes to a profit-sharing scheme. Unite had requested a meeting with…Read more…
‘Dark day’ for workers
The government’s controversial trade union Bill was granted royal assent this afternoon (May 4) – and now is officially made law. The Bill – which will now as law severely hobble the ability…Read more…
Make one change
Chris Baldwin is head of collaborative learning at William Allitt School in Derbyshire and an ATL rep. There’s so much that’s not cool at the moment in teaching. A lot in education revolves around…Read more…
Your fight is our fight
Unite senior rep and Bentley maintenance technician Stuart Davis shares with us below his experience as part of a delegation to Mexico with Workers Uniting. Workers Uniting, a joint…Read more…
A European success story
Together with Unite national officer Ian Waddell and Labour MEP Glenis Willmott, IndustriAll Europe – the European trade union federation for manufacturing – hosted a high-level European aerospace…Read more…
Cost-cutting ‘death traps’
Dangerous cost cutting has turned more than 80 military training grounds into “death traps” Unite has warned, after the Ministry of Defence (MoD) allowed ‘look out’ firing range wardens to be…Read more…
Someone on our side
Londoners will decide the future of their city in tomorrow’s (May 5) mayoral election. It’s set to be a contest between Labour MP for Tooting Sadiq Khan and Tory MP for Richmond Park and North…Read more…
Another report confirms #Brexit would cause massive uncertainty for working people
The House of Lords’ influential European Union Committee has produced another important report ahead of the EU referendum on 23 June. Following their earlier report in March calling for more attention to be paid to the interests of working people, today’s report emphasises the years of…Read more…
Brexit arguments on working time don’t add up
The main workplace rights to be targeted for supporters of Leaving the EU at next month’s referendum are around working time (although protection against discrimination, fairness for agency workers and health and safety are also in the frame.) Leave campaigners claim that the Working Time Directive…Read more…
Tip top result
Business secretary Sajid Javid sided with Unite as the government published yesterday (May 1) a long-awaited report on tipping practices in restaurants and hotels. In what Unite officer for…Read more…
Millions have been wasted on failed baseline. It’s time to listen to ATL members
Last week, education secretary Nicky Morgan appeared before the Education Select Committee to defend some of the controversial proposals in the white paper, Educational Excellence Everywhere. She…Read more…
Lawyers confirm #Brexit would put your rights at work at risk
Today GQ Employment Law LLP has issued a report endorsing TUC concerns that Brexit could endanger rights at work. The ’boutique’ law firm suggests that weekly working time limits could well be under threat, along with overtime pay, and requirements to consult before mass…Read more…
Australia’s migration system wouldn’t work here either
When supporters of tougher immigration controls are asked what system they would introduce, they often point to Australia’s points-based system. I often get the feeling that this is as much an appeal to old Commonwealth ties as much as a rational answer to the question, with potentially…Read more…
As death returns to May Day protests, Turkey is sliding back into dictatorship
We – and colleagues in the Turkish trade union movement – have been writing about the struggles of the Turkish trade union movement on Stronger Unions for years. At one point, things were…Read more…
TUC joins May Day protests for jailed Iranian teachers
The TUC has supported a letter this 1 May calling on the Iranian government to release two Iranian teacher union leaders and scores of other jailed trade unionists as part of a general call “to…Read more…
#ISDS: Government position shows ideology trumps evidence
We’re often told that Governments are committed to ‘evidence-based policy making’, although it often seems that it’s the other way round. Now we see, starkly revealed, how far the UK government’s trade policy is based far more on ideology than evidence. A Freedom of…Read more…
A UK without manufacturing
Economics professor Patrick Minford came out yesterday (April 28) to say that “if we left the EU, it seems that we would mostly eliminate manufacturing.” But, Minford – who was a major…Read more…
Stagecoach asked to ‘think again’
Unite, Britain’s biggest union, will express concern at a meeting next week about the proposed closure of the Stagecoach bus depot in Dundee. Bosses at the bus company have advised union…Read more…