TUC Congress 2013: Green fringe meeting

TUC Congress 2013: Green fringe meeting
Green fringe meeting: Tuesday 10 September, 12.30 to 13.45
Climate change - The burning questions
With Diana Holland, AGS, Unite; Sue Ferns, Director of Research & Communications, Prospect/TUC General Council; Dom Anderson, NUS Vice President; and Matt Wrack, GS, Fire Brigades Union.
How can we burst the 'carbon bubble' and drive green growth? The 'greenest government ever' seems a distant illusion, with the Coalition backing 'fracking' and new oil and gas subsidies. There's a green alternative to austerity, mass unemployment and low pay. We need a jobs-rich, green industrial strategy to create tens of thousands of quality, skilled jobs across the UK. And we need to take action ourselves, building greenworkplaces and new alliances for greenand decent jobs.
Organised by the Trade Unions Sustainable Development Advisory Committee (TUSDAC).
TUC Congress - energy motions
The preliminary agenda for TUC Congress (Bournemouth, September 9-11)

http://www.tuc.org.uk/tucfiles/625/Congress_2013_Preliminary_Agenda.pdf

www.tuc.org.uk

Stop Pickles attacking PCS

Noel Lynch via lists.greenparty.org.uk	6:07 PM (1 hour ago)
to gptu

Subject: Fw: Stop Pickles attacking PCS



Dear All,



It's interesting that the government is trying to end the check off system
on the Deaprtment of Communities and Local Government. Do they see PCS as
standing in the way of smashing local authority staff?



I encourage everybody in Barnet Trades Union Council and BAPS to sign this
petition.



If you have any further enquiries, please do not hesitate to contact me.



Yours fraternally



Austin Harney,

Secretary of Barnet Trades Union Council.







----- Forwarded Message -----
From: PCS Publications <donotreply@commail.pcs.org.uk>
To: au5tin67@yahoo.co.uk
Sent: Friday, 16 August 2013, 12:12
Subject: Stop Pickles attacking PCS


<http://commail.pcs.org.uk/index.php?e=AF652003A0520FC4E9373A309F6A9FBD16350
9E69019B4FE9BA9A2030BB6E0A563B9C1D0FD7531E0&f=6139%20Action%20now%20eNewslet
ter.jpg>


Dear Colleague,

We need your help to stop Eric Pickles ending the decades old "check-off"
system of paying union subs direct from wages in the department for
communities and local government (DCLG). www.pcs.org.uk/dclgsolidarity

We have only been given a few weeks notice to sign all our members up to
direct debit. Our reps have been prevented from signing members up to direct
debit in the workplace. PCS has made it clear it will pay for the check-off
service, but this has been ignored.

It is clear that Pickles decision is nothing than an attempt to undermine
the strength of our union within his department.

We are determined to resist this attack on basic trade union rights. We have
taken our case to the high court and there will be a hearing on 3 September.

Our members in DCLG need a strong union and they need your support. If
Pickles gets his way, then other Ministers may follow.

Tell DCLG permanent secretary Sir Bob Kerslake you do not accept this
decision to  www.pcs.org.uk/dclg

Thanks

Public and Commercial Services Union
http://www.pcs.org.uk/
02078012727

London Green Party Slams “Sadistic” Benefit Cap

London Green Party Slams “Sadistic” Benefit Cap 

The London Green Party has slammed the government’s benefit cap being rolled out across London today as “sadistic” and has called upon London’s Councillors to show compassion in implementing the policy. 

The cap, which has already been trialled in Bromley, Croydon, Enfield, and Haringey, means that the amount of benefit couples and single parents can claim per week will be limited to £500. This applies to the most commonly claimed benefits – Child Benefit, Housing Benefit, Jobseeker’s Allowance, and Income Support. Today marks the final stage of the roll-out of the cap. 

The London Green Party has staunchly opposed the cap since it was first introduced, stating that it will hit the poorest the hardest. The party quotes research from London Councils which shows that the introduction of the cap will lead to 133,000 households being unable to afford their rent due to the high cost of living in the capital. The party argues that the result will be an increase in homelessness in the capital as more and more families are forced into poverty. 

Caroline Allen, a London Green Party candidate for the forthcoming 2014 European election said: “The government is pursuing a sadistic policy. It’s the old strategy of divide and rule. They’re creating a false idea that the country is made up of ‘benefit scroungers’ and ‘taxpayers’ whereas in reality this is an incredibly cynical oversimplification. Research has shown time and again that very few people choose benefits as a lifestyle and it's the landlords who have got rich from the rising housing benefit bill while people who want to find work simply can't, or end up on zero hours contracts and poverty pay.

The benefit cap is just one part of its continuing efforts to force poorer people out ofLondon. In Haringey, one of the London boroughs subject to the initial trial of the cap, there has already been a sharp increase in eviction notices for families who, as a result of the cap, now simply cannot afford to pay their rent. This, sadly, is going to the reality for more and more households across London as the cap is enforced across the capital.”

The Party has called upon councils to ensure they are doing all they can to support those affected by the changes in benefits. Ultimately though radical change of our housing system is required. The Green Party is calling for rent caps, new social housing, and an end to write to buy and a land value tax. All proposals that would readjust our broken housing system, the Party states. 

Caroline added, “60 years ago my Grandparents suffered at the hands of a slum landlord and were forced out of London due to the high cost of housing, leaving their family and friends behind. At least they had decent new council housing to move to. I'm horrified this is happening again and where is there for vulnerable people to move to now? Left to the mercy of rogue buy-to let landlords, who seem to me to be the real scroungers here.” 

 ENDS

 Contact and Spokespeople

For more information please contact Matt Hawkins, co-Media Officer of the London Green Party on london.media@greenparty.org.uk or 07515 895998.

 Notes

1.       For more information on the benefits cap, please see: https://www.gov.uk/benefit-cap

2.       For more information on the London Green Party, please visit: http://london.greenparty.org.uk/

3.       For further details on the research conducted by London Councils, please see: http://www.londoncouncils.gov.uk/news/current/pressdetail.htm?pk=1406&showpage=-1

4.       For further information on the debate over whether benefits can be considered a “lifestyle choice” please see: http://www.tuc.org.uk/extras/Welfare_Benefits_A_neccessity_not_a_lifestyle_choice.pdf

Saturday 24 August 2013 Croydon Trades Union Council special event to support George Tapp

On Saturday 24 August 2013 Croydon Trades Union Council is holding a special event to support George Tapp who was so seriously injured while campaigning against Black Listing. The event will also be an opportunity for Trades Unionists to show general support for the Anti Black Listing Campaign.

The event at Ruskin House (Croydon's Trade Union and Labour Centre)

23 Coombe Road, Croydon CR0 1BD will be addressed by leading speakers from the Anti Black Listing Campaign. There will be live music and the Ruskin House Club Bar will be open from 7:00 p.m.

This is a very worthy cause - please support.

Roy Aird

Secretary - Croydon TUC

PENTONVILLE 5 ANNUAL COMMEMORATION 1972-2013

REMEMBER OUR HISTORY – FIGHT FOR TODAY

FIGHT THE ATTACK ON UNIONS

PENTONVILLE 5

ANNUAL COMMEMORATION 1972-2013

FRIDAY 16 AUGUST 2013 18.00

UNITE HQ 128 THEOBALDS ROAD LONDON WC1X 8TN

(nearest tube HOLBORN)

Celebrating a vital battle in working class history

Concentrating on what is to be done today to win trade union freedom and build solidarity action

Speakers include the

TONY BURKE (UNITE) Campaign for Trade Union Freedom

the Anti-Blacklist Campaign

Organised by

Cities of London & Westminster Trades Council

with

Islington Trades Union Council - Dockers Network -

Greater London Association of Trade Union Councils

We Own It - A Message for Railways, Royal Mail, the NHS and Much More

Posted: 06/08/2013 00:00

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When I give speeches up and down the country, two topics vie for the loudest cheers from a wide variety of audiences - one is the Green Party's call to return railways to public ownership, the second is when I say "we believe in a publicly owned and publicly run NHS".

Yet somehow, I find when talking to journalists, both of these ideas - indeed our strong support for public ownership of essential public services - is regarded as a "radical" idea.

It's an indictment of the state of our national politics - the distance that the ideas of our political class in the form of three largest parties has moved from the general public - that it's hard to find an organised voice outside that of the Green Party and the unions speaking up for it.

Yet the public - and the Green Party - understand that privatisation and outsourcing have been disastrous, built on putting public funds straight into private profits, cutting the pay and condition of workers and the quality of services. And all too often, as we've been finding with the water companies - the piling of debts on to essential public services, while capital is extracted to further boost private profits and financial risks multiplied.

We've seen a long trail of disasters and all too often tragic disasters. You just have to recite the acronyms - A4E, G4S, Atos.

It's unsurprising then that a new organisation, We Own It, launching today, has found that the public rejects default privatisation by 10:1, and that 80% think that private bids.

It has launched with a draft bill, the Public Service Users Bill, which would require public ownership to be considered before privatising or outsourcing services, as well as in the bidding process.
We Own It's new report 'Better in Public Hands' says public ownership is making a comeback, not that public affection and sense of its value ever went away.

The models need to be carefully considered - renationalisation or maintaining national ownership makes sense in some cases (notably and topically Royal Mail), but often what we need to be looking towards is a more decentralised, flexible model that obeys the principle of subsidiarity, decisions being made as close as possible to the places where they'll have an impact.

This is something that's particularly pressing and important in electricity generation - we need to encourage the model of local mutual ownership of wind farms, of solar panels, or run-of-river generating schemes and, in future, tidal generation.

If a multinational company sweeping into town and plans to build a windfarm on the hill, transforming the landscape, but the profits make no local impact, sweeping instead off to London - and all too often then straight into the nearest convenient tax haven - it's unsurprising if this seems an imposition, an insult to be resisted. If the wind farm is owned by, planned by the community, the benefits flowing down into town in the term of dividends on community bonds, funding for the local school and a new roof for the village hall, however, it will be seen, experienced very differently.

But we need to start thinking too about ways, in a time of increasing water stress, we can get back control over our water supplies, our electricity and gas grids, and more.

That's a big challenge for We Own It - and a good place to start is keeping what we still have. The NHS is a critical, popular issue that I'm sure the new organisation will be working on.

 

Follow Natalie Bennett on Twitter: www.twitter.com/@natalieben

Migrant Political Activists Support Reverend Paul Nicolson's Anti-Benefit Cuts Stance in Haringey

Sunday, 4 August 2013

Migrant Political Activists Support Reverend Paul Nicolson's Anti-Benefit Cuts Stance in Haringey


On Thursday 1 August I operated as Secretary of the non-party-political Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group that benefits Brent & Camden & Beyond, as we say in the KUWG. On Friday I was in Haringey Green Party branding, supporting council tax protester Revd Paul Nicolson of Tottenham outside Tottenham Magistrates Court. Clarence was the face of the KUWG for the photo-shoot attended by a photographer from the Haringey Independent and others — including Tottenham's post thundery shower midges that left me with souvenirs of the occasion today!

The police objected to the idea of people being photographed against the backdrop of the Magistrates Court, and so we had to be photographed with our backs to the main road.

Among those who attended, there was a family from Derbyshire who read of Paul Nicolson's stand in Wednesday's Daily Mirror: “Reverend Paul Nicolson: Retired Anglican vicar ready to go to jail in his battle for poor”. Paul was also supported by Haringey Housing Action/Haringey Solidarity Group people, Claire Glasman and Petra Dando of Camden United for Benefit Justice. Clarence of KUWG was also one of those who went into the court with Paul and Paul's son and daughter. Paul's son joked with me that he had come along to disown his father when Paul gets sent down. (I had told Paul's son that it was great that he was there in support of his father, in contrast with the way that one of Mahatma Gandhi's sons was so disgusted with his own upbringing that he became a Muslim.)

Before going into the court, Paul gave a great speech that follows in the pattern of Martin Luther King's 'I Have a Dream' speech 50 years ago this 28 August, updating and relocating it to mention wiping out the meanness of sanctions, £71.60 a week JSA and low birth weight futures. (There is currently a low birth weight rate in parts of Tottenham that is higher than Turkey's.) Paul concluded by saying that he is prepared to go to prison or to only pay his Council Tax when Haringey Council start using it to genuinely help Haringey residents stay in Haringey. I summarised, "So you are keen to pay for Council services but not Council disservices.

"Absolutely!" he affirmed.

Epilogue: For information regarding what went on in the court, see Jaber Mohamed's report, “Reverend Paul Nicolson uses appearance at Enfield and Haringey Magistrates Court to appeal for leniency for victims of benefit cuts.” And more information regarding , what the Chairperson of Taxpayers Against Poverty's very public stance is about than Chairman of the bench Freddy Lawson could tolerate, go to the Taxpayers Against Poverty website.

By Alan Wheatley of Haringey Green Party and Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group originally published on http://haringeygreens.blogspot.co.uk/2013/08/migrant-political-activists-support.html