Training is essential in the labour market of today and tomorrow Skills and qualifications are needed more than ever and at every level, writes unionlearn’s Tom Wilson. The number of jobs needing no qualifications fell from 28% in 2006 to 23% in 2012; jobs requiring a degree rose from 20% to…Read more…
While the ECB print money, was ex-Governor Lord King calling for fiscal stimulus in the UK?
On Monday evening at the London School of Economics, Lord King, former Governor of the Bank of England, and Sir Alan Budd, former chief economist at HM Treasury and a founder member of the Monetary Policy Committee, had ‘a conversation about central banking’ with Professor Charles Goodhart in the…Read more…
We need to do more to recognise and facilitate growth and career development
David Weston is the founder and Chief Executive of the Teacher Development Trust. CPD isn’t a luxury add-on to the work of teaching, it is an absolutely central element of being a professional. The…Read more…
Getting excited about CPD reminds us why we chose to do this job
Ellie Dix is the Director of Pivotal Education. CPD for teachers is a necessity. When CPD works well, it is genuinely useful and can make a huge difference not just to the practice of an individual…Read more…
Today’s employment figures (Jan 2015)
I have a post up at Left Foot Forward, looking at today’s labour market statistics. What seems to be happening is that the quality of employment is improving, but the increases in employment and falls in unemployment are slowing down. The prospects for earnings are still quite poor: at the…Read more…
100 claimants with mental health problems have their benefits stopped every day
Figures obtained by the Methodist Church from the Department of Work and Pensions have revealed that claimants thought to be unfit for work due to mental health problems are disproportionately and increasingly likely to have their benefits stopped under sanctions. The DWP’s own figures show that in…Read more…
£1billion a year essential for new flood defences
£1billion a year must be spent on flood defences over the next decade to cope with the rising threat of flooding, according to the Association of British Insurers (ABI) and campaigners like Friends of the Earth. In a new initiative, they argue for an end to building new homes in flood-risk areas,…Read more…
Can we make 2015 the year of good work?
What is a good company? This morning, the Co-operative Bank announced an update of its ethical policy based on responses from 74,000 customers and staff. As a result, the bank will not lend to companies involved in irresponsible gambling, payday lendin…Read more…
Global pressure forces withdrawal of Thai prison labour plans
Campaigning has paid off again. Last week I blogged about a campaign we’d joined to stop the Thai Government’s plans to force prisoners to work in the notorious Thai fishing industry….Read more…
Could the Greeks bring us gifts this Sunday?
This Sunday, the Greek people go to the polls in what must be one of the most important elections not just for Greece but for Europe as a whole. What is at stake is the future of democratic control of the economy, and the European establishment’s love affair with austerity. Nowhere in Europe…Read more…
Are the improvements in the labour market recovery being overstated?
Employment levels may be rising to record levels; however, this is partly a result of the rising numbers in the working population. The employment rate at 73.0 per cent only recently returned to its pre-crisis peak; whereas the 6.0 per cent unemploymen…Read more…
Use your vote!
Mark Baker is president of ATL. 99% of ATL’s members cast their vote in this year’s National Presidential election! That would be a nice headline and I encourage everyone who can to make it…Read more…
What more will it take to get corporate courts out of the EU-US trade deal?
This week, the European Commission finally released the results of the consultation forced on it nearly a year ago about Investor-State Dispute Settlement (ISDS) in the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership (TTIP), the EU-US trade deal. While …Read more…
IMF: looking on the bright side, or the ‘right side’?
The International Monetary Fund (IMF) doesn’t have a fantastic reputation around the world for the damage it did to developing and Asian economies during the years of the neoliberal ‘Washington consensus’. Confessing to getting its analysis of the Greek economy catastrophically…Read more…
Growing funding crisis in local government threatens public services
A growing funding crisis in local government is threatening the future of local public services in England. According to new analysis published today in Austerity Uncovered significant cuts have already been made to statutory adult social care and children’s services – with more cuts to come….Read more…
Union-busting at the heart of this government?
We’ve long been used to the hostility towards trade unions exhibited by some of the more excitable elements on the fringes of the Tory right. From Aiden Burley and the Trade Union Reform Campaign to…Read more…
Saving Our Safety Net Fact of the Week: Most Remploy workers never got another job
In 2012 the government closed down the subsidy for the disabled workers in more than fifty Remploy factories around the country. By September 2013 all but three had closed; the GMB estimates that 2,700 workers lost their jobs. Some of those weren’t disabled; the House of Commons library estimates…Read more…
Employers named and shamed for not paying – a warning for retail.
The government has today named another 37 employers who have failed to pay the proper minimum wage. Between them they owed £177,000 to their workers* This brings the total named this year to 92. It is good to see those who don’t meet the legal minimum requirement being publicly named in this…Read more…
Unions join condemnations of Thai prison labour plans
The TUC has joined a coalition of 43 union and human rights organisations condemning the regime in Thailand for a planned pilot project recruiting prisoners to fill labour shortages in the…Read more…
Core inflation is very far from “relatively stable”
There’s a lot of “good deflation” stories in the media today. (‘Almost certainly’ so, according to the FT.) One of the common themes sets the large fall in headline inflation against a rise on the month in ‘core’ inflation (i.e. inflation excluding energy,…Read more…