While trade unionists spent years being monitored by construction firms in a shocking blacklisting scandal uncovered seven years ago, with many workers not being able to find work for decades, it is…Read more…
At the mercy of landlords
Buy-to-let landlords are using loopholes to avoid new taxes which come into effect April of next year, with many saying that they intend to hike up rents, according to a new report. Chancellor…Read more…
Benefits sanctions a failure
The Tory government’s benefits sanctions regime, which has brought misery to millions and in some cases has even been fatal, continues unabated under the assumption that it works – that it gets…Read more…
Cashing in on austerity
Council austerity cuts have over the last six years decimated public services and have cost more than half a million jobs, with local authorities in the poorest areas being hit the hardest. …Read more…
‘Rotten system’
The UK’s burgeoning “gig economy”, which often relies on exploitative zero-hour contracts and questionable definitions of self-employment, will cost the Treasury £3.5bn in 2020/21, new figures show….Read more…
‘Empty proposals’
The collapse of retailer British Home Stores (BHS) earlier this year will go down in history as one of the biggest business scandals of all time, with tens of thousands of people losing their jobs…Read more…
Care for the NHS
Just days after chancellor Phillip Hammond hardly bothered to mention the NHS in his Autumn Statement, the Labour party launched a major campaign on Saturday (November 26) in support of the…Read more…
Bleak future?
On the eve of the government’s Autumn Statement on Wednesday (November 23), Unite has revealed the necessity of immediate state intervention following a survey of the offshore…Read more…
‘Nothing short of robbery’
Dodgy recruitment agencies are cheating the taxpayer out of “hundreds of millions” of pounds, a Guardian investigation has found. Temp agencies have raked in cash through “contrived” financial…Read more…
Energy of youth
Young people working in the energy sector convened for their Young Reps’ Week earlier this month – a new Unite course that immersed reps in all the work that Unite does in and out of the workplace,…Read more…
‘Ticking post-Brexit time bomb’
Don’t be fooled by Tuesday’s (November 15) unexpected drop in inflation, leading economists have said – in post-EU referendum Britain, families from across all income brackets should brace themselves…Read more…
A Britain for all
Shadow business secretary, Clive Lewis, has set out Labour’s industrial strategy, calling for “a new social contract” between industry, business and people. The plans, outlined in a major…Read more…
Cash not secret reforms call
Frontline staff and patients are being left out of secret plans to shrink NHS services and cut costs, a new report has warned. An investigation by the King’s Fund think tank shows that NHS…Read more…
Punished – for depression
Paddy Cunningham, a rail signal-box worker, fell seriously ill and, like any of us would, he took time off from work. He eventually recovered and was eager to return to the job. But his…Read more…
‘Truly regressive’
Employers in Northern Ireland have been instructed by the department of communities to act as benefit debt collectors with the power to deduct up to 40 per cent of people’s net earnings, Unite has…Read more…
Actions speak loudest
Prime minister Theresa May used her first speech following Donald Trump’s US election victory to castigate the financial elite for being out of touch with ordinary people – at an event where May and…Read more…
Does the end of the NHS start here?
Virgin has become the first private firm in the country to run adult social care after being handed a controversial £700m deal by a Tory-led council. Richard Branson’s Virgin Care is poised to…Read more…
The freedom to organise
Fifty years ago – on November 10, 1966 an industrial dispute began in Stockport, which attracted national media coverage; saw mass picketing; international solidarity action and the eventual…Read more…
Any deliverance for the deliverers?
When we think of someone who is self-employed, we often imagine an enterprising entrepreneur, someone who decides exactly when they themselves work, and for how long. It might be hard…Read more…
Bedroom tax win
The Supreme Court has delivered a blow to Tory welfare policy by ruling that two families were discriminated against by the government’s hated “bedroom tax”. The ruling, in favour of a spina…Read more…