UNISON attacks Scottish CBI hypocrisy over public service cuts

12 September 2010

UNISON Scotland today responded to a call from the Chair of CBI Scotland to end the ‘war of words’ over public services. At the CBI Scotland annual dinner Linda Urquhart declared it was time to “call a halt to ‘them and us’ attitudes which have prevailed for decades”.

UNISON Scotland Convenor Mike Kirby said:
“A halt to them and us attitudes from big business would indeed be welcome. However, it is hard to take such calls seriously when the rest of Linda Urquhart’s speech was an unrestrained attack on public service delivery.”

“The current financial crisis was caused by private corporate folly and the deregulated financial system that the CBI supported. It is public service workers and the communities they serve that are paying the price of the policy agenda promoted by big business. To impose this failed policy on public services would be further economic vandalism.”

The CBI leaders speech also called for further privatisation of public services. Evidence submitted by UNISON Scotland to Parliament last week shows that this approach has cost the taxpayer millions of pounds in extra costs and undermined the integrated delivery of services.

Mike Kirby said:
“In a week that has seen the spectacular collapse of a leading outsourcing company (Connaught), it is a strange time to call for the imposition of further chaos on hard pressed councils. Public services should be democratically accountable to local communities, not to the Boards of big business who are driven solely by the need to make profits.”

ends

Note to Editors:
UNISON Scotland’s briefing to parliament on these issues can be found online at http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/ briefings/index.html


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UNISON Scotland Briefing for MSPs on Independent Budget Review

9 September 2010

Ahead of a debate on the Independent Budget Review in the Scottish Parliament this morning, UNISON Scotland has published a Briefing for MSPs on our website www.unison-scotland.org.uk

 "The IBR report does not address the disastrous consequences of spending cuts for Scotland. Whilst some of the factual analysis is helpful, the solutions are largely a rather tired rehash of right wing economic orthodoxy. There is an alternative, and UNISON is calling on MSPs to champion a better way forward for Scotland."

Briefing: Key Points

• The financial projections, whilst disastrous for public services and the economy, actually understate the scale of cuts in local services.
• There is a credible economic alternative to cuts in public spending.
• The privatisation of Scottish Water would contribute nothing to the capital budget; result in higher bills to the charge payer and transfer control of Scotland’s greatest asset abroad.
• Outsourcing will cost more and break up integrated service delivery.
• Shared services will make, at best, only a long term contribution to cost savings.
• It is unfair to ask public service workers to pay for the failure of private corporate folly through pay cuts and reduced pensions.
• Universal provision is more efficient and contributes to a better performing more equal society.
• Cuts at this level and at this time in the economic cycle, will damage the economy and result in huge job cuts in the private as well as the public sector.
• There is a better way! At UNISON Public Works and the STUC Better Way websites.

See full briefing here: Briefing for MSPs


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Prentis warns Scotland’s political leaders against slashing public services based on ‘ice cream van economics’

Date: 3 Sept 10

UPDATE: Dave Prentis speaking at
'There is an alternative' conference Saturday 4 September

UNISON General Secretary Dave Prentis will tomorrow (Saturday) warn Scottish politicians to ignore the ‘ice cream van economics’ of the recent Independent Budget Review report.

He will tell a major conference in Glasgow that the country’s political leaders will be judged on how far they distance themselves from the July report and fight to protect the services that people rely on.

He said today that the report by the so-called three wise men painted a vision of a future “where services are privatised or charged for, if they are there at all” and where 35-60,000 jobs are cut.


Dave added: “I don’t want to be too harsh on these three not very wise men. They were asked to deliver a package of cuts. That’s what they have done.


“A proper review of the budget would have started by looking at the services we need, then working out how you raise the money to pay for them.


“You don’t look at a Government’s finances and say ‘we’ve got this much, what can we get for it?’


“That’s what kids do at an ice cream van. We should be able to expect better from experts looking at a country’s finances.”


UNISON Scotland’s ‘There is an alternative’ conference tomorrow will see more than 200 union and community activists from around the country share experiences about threats to local services and discuss how to develop the union’s Public Works campaign.


Keynote speaker Stephen Boyd, STUC assistant secretary, will deliver an economic analysis that demonstrates that there is an alternative to the cuts and privatisation agenda.


Dave added: “I have a message for the Scottish Government. The Independent Budget Review is just a tartan version of the Tory plan for the rest of the UK. It’s a plan that the Scottish people rejected, overwhelmingly, at the ballot box only a few months ago.


“We’ll be able to judge the truth of how well Alex Salmond, or the other party leaders, stand up for Scotland by how much distance they put between themselves and this plan to devastate the country’s public services.”


ENDS


Details of the conference are on UNISON Scotland’s website at www.unison-scotland.org.uk/publicworks/04sep/index.html  
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UNISON comprehensively rejects the Independent Budget Review proposals

Date: Thursday 29 July 2010

UNISON Scotland today comprehensively rejected the Independent Budget Review proposals as an assault on public services that will damage the economy.

Scottish Organiser Glyn Hawker said:

“This is not an attempt to balance the books. It is a major assault on vital public services and it is about opening up profit opportunities for the fat cats.

“The report hides behind a rhetoric of ‘tough choices’ and ‘targeting’, but what these proposals will do is reduce the quality of life for all but the richest, as the services we use are removed or run down.

“Once the Scottish people realise that this means handing over their water service to the bankers, reducing the quality of their child’s education and cutting back on their elderly relatives’ care, they will reject this agenda.”

As well as up to 60,000 job losses, the report includes a range of proposals that run the risk of putting us back into recession.

Glyn added:
“Job losses on this scale will of course hit services. And their insistence on redundancies and pay freezes run the risk of taking us back into recession. With 70p in every pound spent on public services finding its way back into the local economy the programme of mass redundancies and real terms wage cuts will be a real blow to many local economies across Scotland.”

UNISON, the largest public services union, has said all along that the real issue is the kind of services our society wants and how we pay for them. It is wrong for politicians to be willing to make cuts on such a scale, yet not to consider fair taxation. The Scottish Parliament has tax varying powers and the people of Scotland voted for it to have them.

The report suggests the council tax freeze is unsustainable and that is correct, but UNISON would also say it is unsustainable not to look at asking those who can pay more in tax to do so.

Glyn said:
“Cuts on this scale will hit middle and low income families hard and will be especially hard on women. If classroom assistants lose their jobs, mums will be expected to volunteer. They also face cuts in before and after school services that could affect whether they can work.”


UNISON response to the Report’s chapter conclusions and recommendations:

Public Spending Environment
UNISON believes all public services are valuable, and should be ring fenced. Why should the ordinary people of Scotland pay for the bankers’ greed? Let us be clear though - the Independent Budget Review argues for a policy of no protected areas in public sector: this means health and education will face cuts along with the rest of our public services.

Fair taxes and government borrowing remain the most cost-effective ways of funding public spending.


Efficiency
The Review accepts that efficiencies will become ever more "challenging" - and then sets a minimum 2% annual efficiency target. The real agenda however is revealed in the well worn recommendations for shared services arrangements across the public sector; and "mainstream roles" for the private and voluntary/third sectors in the delivery of public services. These are not plans for efficient and effective public services - they are in fact costly and inefficient ways of opening up public services to profiteers.


Remuneration and workforce
The loss of up to 60,000 jobs will have a major impact on services. The proper place to deal with public sector pay is in negotiations. Pay freezes and pay cuts for public service workers will damage economic recovery, and hit local communities and small businesses too. UNISON will continue to campaign for fair pay as inflation rises around 5%.

Flexibility would open up issues of equal pay which we are only now resolving after 40 years of the Equal Pay Act.


Universal services
Introducing charges and means testing to services that currently benefit everyone creates an expensive new bureaucracy. If there is a concern that some people are receiving services they can well afford, the value for money option is to charge them via taxation rather than setting up a ‘department for social insecurity’ to administer charging.


Capital
Scottish Water should remain in democratic control. Setting it up as a ‘public interest company’ would be privatisation by stealth.

An enhanced role for the Scottish Futures Trust is likely to see further wasteful use of private financing for public sector projects. Lessons must be learned from the hugely expensive PFI/PPP projects.


Shaping the future
Scotland’s Parliament should provide leadership by working to fund quality public services and resisting a cuts and privatisation agenda.


ends



Notes to Editors:

1. UNISON responses to the report, including two earlier releases today, are here on our frequently updated blog at: http://unison-scotland.blogspot.com/

2. UNISON’s alternative budget is at: www.unison.org.uk/acrobat/18887.pdf

3. UNISON’s submission to the Independent Budget Review is at: http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/response/UNISONResponse_IndependentBudgetReviewApril2010.pdf



For Further Information Please Contact:
Glyn Hawker, Scottish Organiser (Bargaining & Equal Pay) 07876 441 237
Fiona Montgomery, Communications Officer 0141 342 2877 (o) 07908 672 890 (m)
Malcolm Burns, Communications Officer 0141 342 2877 (o) 07958 063 182 (m)

 
 

'Not in the public interest': UNISON calls on government to reject privatisation of Scottish Water by stealth

Defend Scotland's Water: briefing
on the case for public ownership.
Click here for pdf

Date: Thu 29 July 2010

UNISON has called on the Scottish Government to reject the proposal to effectively privatise Scottish Water contained in the Independent Budget Review.

Gerry Crawley, Regional Organiser, said:

"The proposal to privatise Scottish Water by stealth is not acceptable - and is certainly not in the public interest. We call on the Scottish Government to reject this unwise proposal.

"The pro-privatisation sharks have been circling around Scottish Water, first proposing a different funding mechanism, then a supposedly mutual model. The latest disguise is what they call a 'public interest company' similar to Welsh Water. These are all attempts to privatise by stealth.

Gerry Crawley said:
"We certainly do not want follow the Welsh Water model as a mutual or 'public interest company'. In the capital intensive water industry, bodies like these are effectively controlled by the private financial institutions. They would insist that their risk is minimised by transferring services and jobs to English and European private water companies. That is what is happening at Welsh Water."

"Any move away from democratic control and towards private funding - including under the guise of a 'public interest company' - would actually cost us all more. The people of Scotland do not want to see profiteering from such an essential public service. It is simply not in the public interest."

Gerry Crawley said:
“Scottish Water belongs to the people. It is owned by the Scottish government for the Scottish people. This issue has already been settled by a referendum. UNISON is 100% certain that the Scottish people will reject any attempt to remove Scottish Water from democratic control."


ends


Note for Editors:

1. UNISON’s recent briefing Defend Scotland’s Water has highlighted how the pro-privatisation sharks are circling around Scottish Water; why these vested interests want it sold off at a knock-down price; and how private finance would lead to private control. Defend Scotland’s Water is available on the UNISONScotland website at http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/water/defendscotlandswater_mar2010.pdf

2. UNISON, along with the STUC and the other unions involved in the water industry all believe that we should join with the worldwide movement in favour of democratisation of water. The unions have produced a discussion paper It’s Scotland’s Water outlining ways to greater accountability for Scottish Water. It is available on the UNISON website at http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/water/scotland's_water.pdf


For Further Information Please Contact:
Gerry Crawley, Regional Organiser 07958 121 805 (m)
Fiona Montgomery, Communications Officer 0141 342 2877 (o) 07908 672 890 (m)
Malcolm Burns, Communications Officer 0141 342 2877 (o) 07958 063 182 (m)

 
 
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UNISON rejects unwise prescription for assault on public services – initial response to IBR

Date: Thursday 29 July


UNISON today rejected the prescription of the Independent Budget Review for an assault on Scotland’s public services and privatising Scottish Water.

Scottish Organiser Glyn Hawker said that the report trots out the same tired old dogma that ordinary people need to pay the price for a financial crisis they did not create.

Glyn added: “Crawford Beveridge said in March that we faced Sophie’s Choice and there is no way to implement these cuts without causing great pain. These proposals are unwise, will cause great pain and we think the people of Scotland will reject this approach.

“UNISON Scotland believes there is an alternative that politicians should be fighting for – an alternative that looks at what public services the Scottish people want in a decent society.

“We can afford quality services. We should not be hitting ordinary people with cuts to services they rely on, with cuts to pay and jobs and family income when bankers still pick up huge bonuses and don’t pay their fair share towards services we all rely on.

“These proposals will create a more unequal society. Crawford Beveridge said there are no silver bullets and the report says that we need to do more with less but we can’t. It will be less with less. And the end result is that the rich will be able to pay for services but middle and low income families will be hardest hit.”



Notes to Editors:

1. Glyn Hawker and other UNISON representatives are available for comment and reaction to the Independent Budget Review report.

2. A detailed response to the report will be issued later this afternoon.

3. UNISON responses to the report will be posted on our frequently updated blog here at: http://unison-scotland.blogspot.com/

4. UNISON’s alternative budget is at: www.unison.org.uk/acrobat/18887.pdf

5. UNISON’s submission to the Independent Budget Review is at: http://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/response/UNISONResponse_IndependentBudgetReviewApril2010.pdf

6. Our news release ‘Removal of Scottish Water from democratic control would be unwise’ is at: www.unison-scotland.org.uk/news/2010/julyaug/2307a.htm


For Further Information Please Contact:
Glyn Hawker, Scottish Organiser (Bargaining & Equal Pay) 07876 441 237
Fiona Montgomery, Communications Officer 0141 342 2877 (o) 07908 672 890 (m)
Malcolm Burns, Communications Officer 0141 342 2877 (o) 07958 063 182 (m)



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