Category Archives: Unison

Starmer gives keynote speech at Labour party conference, introduced by Hillsborough campaigner Margaret Aspinall – UK politics live

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Prime minister will focus on economic growth as an ‘antidote to division’ in address that will seek to strike a more combative, hopeful tone

Wes Streeting, the health secretary, has said that Tony Blair could play a positive role in Gaza helping to lead the administration there proposed under Donald Trump’s peace plan.

In an interview on LBC, Streeting said that Blair’s decision to involve the UK in the Iraq war was “a catastrophic error” that had “devasting consequences”. He said that he personally opposed it at the time.

I also think about Tony Blair’s other legacy, great legacy, which is Northern Ireland, and there he showed that he could bring together sworn enemies to broker a lasting peace.

So if Tony Blair can put those skills to use, if he’s got the confidence of both the Israelis, the Palestinians, and the regional players, as seems to be the case, then great. If he can make that contribution, and that can be another legacy, a positive legacy under his belt, then so much the better.

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No 10 won’t say if fuel payments U-turn will be implemented in time for this winter – UK politics live

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Downing Street unable to say how many more pensioners would receive winter fuel payments or when changes would come in

YouGov has published more details of its polling on the electorate’s relationship with Labour, as covered in the Sky News report mentioned earlier. (See 10.06am.)

It shows that Reform UK supporters are most likely to think that Labour is trying hard to appeal to them – but least likely to say they would respond positively. Only 4% of Reform UK supporters say they would consider voting Labour, the poll says.

I ask her if there will be any changes as demanded by MPs

She says while “we want to make sure we address all of people’s concerns, but stressed: “whatever the fiscal position that the government faces, I think the system as a whole needs to change.”

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No 10 won’t say if fuel payments U-turn will be implemented in time for this winter – UK politics live

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Downing Street unable to say how many more pensioners would receive winter fuel payments or when changes would come in

YouGov has published more details of its polling on the electorate’s relationship with Labour, as covered in the Sky News report mentioned earlier. (See 10.06am.)

It shows that Reform UK supporters are most likely to think that Labour is trying hard to appeal to them – but least likely to say they would respond positively. Only 4% of Reform UK supporters say they would consider voting Labour, the poll says.

I ask her if there will be any changes as demanded by MPs

She says while “we want to make sure we address all of people’s concerns, but stressed: “whatever the fiscal position that the government faces, I think the system as a whole needs to change.”

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Scottish Water staff to strike for two days as pay standoff continues

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Emergency repairs and quality checks for 5m people in Scotland will not be done on Tuesday and Wednesday, union says

Scottish Water staff will strike for two days from the early hours of Tuesday as a standoff over pay continues at the state-owned company.

The striking workers’ union warned that emergency repairs and quality checks to water supplied to 5 million people across Scotland would not be carried out during the action on Tuesday and Wednesday.

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England’s NHS crews ‘watching patients die in back of ambulances’ due to A&E delays

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Survey says queues outside emergency departments are leading to ‘car park care’ and fatalities

Paramedics across England are watching patients die in the back of ambulances because of delays outside emergency departments, according to a survey by Unison.

The gridlock of patients in some of the country’s hospitals has led to queues of up to 20 ambulances outside casualty departments in certain areas. In a number of cases, crews have been forced to wait more than 12 hours before handing over patients.

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UK politics: Unison attacks ‘shambolic’ announcement of NHS England’s abolition – as it happened

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Union says staff will have been left reeling after surprise news that body will be scrapped

Starmer is now talking about regulatation, and giving examples of where he thinks it has gone too far.

l give you an example. There’s a office conversion in Bingley, which, as you know, is in Yorkshire. That is an office conversion that will create 139 homes.

But now the future of that is uncertain because the regulator was not properly consulted on the power of cricket balls. That’s 139 homes. Now just think of the people, the families, the individuals who want those homes to buy, those homes to make their life and now they’re held up. Why? You’ll decide whether this is a good reason because I’m going to quote this is the reason ‘because the ball strike assessment doesn’t appear to be undertaken by a specialist, qualified consultant’. So that’s what’s holding up these 139 homes.

When we had those terrible riots … what we saw then, in response, was dynamic. It was strong, it was urgent. It was what I call active government, on the pitch, doing what was needed, acting.

But for many of us, I think the feeling is we don’t really have that everywhere all of the time at the moment.

The state employs more people than we’ve employed for decades, and yet look around the country; do you see good value everywhere? Because I don’t.

I actually think it’s weaker than it’s ever been, overstretched, unfocused, trying to do too much, doing it badly, unable to deliver the security that people need.

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Starmer union ally joins opposition to rules barring citizenship for small boat refugees

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Head of Unison Christina McAnea is one of 148 signatories of letter warning rules will ‘breed division and mistrust’

Keir Starmer’s most generous union backer has joined faith leaders to warn Yvette Cooper that new rules refusing citizenship to refugees who arrive in small boats will “breed division and distrust” and could fuel attacks on migrant hotels.

Christina McAnea, the general secretary of Unison, and nine Church of England bishops are among 148 signatories of a letter saying the home secretary’s plan to bar naturalisation for anyone who has made a dangerous journey will label tens of thousands of people “second-class citizens”.

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Teaching assistants routinely cover lessons in England and Wales, survey finds

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Exclusive: Research shows extent to which schools are struggling to provide qualified teachers for every class

Hundreds of thousands of pupils in England and Wales are being educated “on the cheap” by low-paid teaching assistants (TAs) covering lessons for teachers who are off sick or have quit, according to new research.

A desperate teacher recruitment crisis, compounded by inadequate funding, means schools across the country are struggling to put a qualified teacher at the front of every class, unions say.

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James Cleverly tells MPs crackdown will cut annual immigration numbers by about 300,000 – as it happened

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Home secretary to announce big hike in salary requirement for migrants to the UK as Rishi Sunak tries to cut net migration figures

Hunt says the government wants to speed up the time it takes to get a connection to the national grid by 90%.

Zanny Minton Beddoes, the editor of the Economist, is interviewing Hunt. She says he has mentioned the 110 policies, but she wants to know what the growth strategy is.

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Royal College of Nursing rejects government pay offer and announces new strike – as it happened

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This live blog has now closed, you can read more on this story here

Nurses in England are preparing to go on strike until Christmas after members of the country’s biggest nursing union voted against the government’s pay deal, the Guardian has learned.

The Royal College of Nursing will announce that members have rejected the government’s offer and will at the same time announce a new ballot for more aggressive strikes likely to last for the next six months.

The vote has closed and the figures are being verified. There is no result until that point. We will make an announcement later today and tell our members first.

Members of the GMB union at the company’s Coventry fulfilment centre will walk out on Sunday for three days.

Further strikes are planned from April 21 to 23.

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Sunak suggests MPs will vote on proposed NI protocol deal and accuses Starmer of wanting to ‘surrender’ to EU – UK politics live

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Latest updates: PM says Commons will be given a chance to ‘express its view’ on any final deal

British Steel has announced the closure of the coking ovens at its Scunthorpe works with the loss of 260 jobs, my colleague Jasper Jolly reports.

Graeme Wearden has reaction to this on his business live blog.

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Strikes by university staff called off after pay breakthrough

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Move follows agreement from employers on lowest-paid workers and review of salary grades

Strikes by university staff over the next two weeks have been called off after a breakthrough in negotiations over pay, pensions and working conditions, unions have announced.

Five unions – Unison, UCU, GMB, Unite and EIS – issued a joint statement with the Universities and Colleges Employers Association (UCEA) confirming three days of strikes will be suspended following talks at the conciliation service Acas, though discussions will continue.

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Nurses set to withdraw from A&E and intensive care units as strike intensifies

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UK’s biggest nursing union prompts alarm among senior officials by calling on intensive care workers to join walkouts

The UK’s biggest nursing union is preparing an escalation of its pay dispute with the government that will see members working in emergency departments, intensive care units and cancer care services being asked to join the next round of strikes.

The Royal College of Nursing (RCN) is also planning to announce the first continuous 48-hour strikes running through two days and two nights, rather than limiting walkouts to the 12 hours from 8am to 8pm, as they have done to date.

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Up to half a million to strike across UK as talks go ‘backwards’

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Action by teachers, civil servants, Border Force staff and train drivers to go ahead, with ministers accused of ‘stonewalling’

Up to half a million workers will go on strike on Wednesday with thousands of schools shut, rail lines closed down and significant border disruption, as unions said negotiations on ending strikes were “going backwards”.

Ministers have been accused of “hoodwinking the public” and freezing any moves towards a settlement with NHS workers and rail unions. Government sources privately conceded that optimism at the beginning of the month about bringing an end to industrial action had faded.

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Revealed: cabinet split over NHS pay disputes piles pressure on Sunak

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Health secretary Steve Barclay urges unions to lobby PM over improved pay offer for striking nurses and ambulance workers

The health and social care secretary Steve Barclay has privately urged trade unions to help him make the case to the Treasury and No 10 for extra money for nurses, ambulance workers and other NHS staff in an extraordinary twist to the escalating crisis over health service strikes, the Observer can reveal.

A serious cabinet split has opened up, with Barclay now wanting more money for all NHS staff except doctors – while Rishi Sunak and Jeremy Hunt, the chancellor, are refusing to budge from their insistence that no more can be offered.

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More than 2,600 ambulance workers from Unite to join existing strike

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Industrial action on 23 January in England and Wales will coincide with strike by Unison members

More than 2,600 additional ambulance workers plan to strike in late January over pay, the trade union Unite announced on Friday.

Unite’s members will join colleagues belonging to Unison in striking on 23 January, with hospital bosses calling for “serious talks” between the government and unions to avoid “even more pressure on already overstretched NHS services”.

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Ambulance staff need firm promise on pay to call off strike, says union

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Mere commitment to discuss pay, so far refused by health secretary, would now be insufficient

Ambulance staff would require a definite commitment from ministers on pay rather than just a promise of talks to call off their planned strike on Wednesday, according to a union leader who said trust had largely broken down with the government.

Christina McAnea, the general secretary of Unison, one of three unions involved in the strike by ambulance crews in England, Wales and Northern Ireland, said even a commitment to discuss pay, thus far refused by the health secretary, Steve Barclay, would now be insufficient.

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RCN accuse government of ‘belligerence’ as talks to avert strike action fail; Wales strikes to go ahead – as it happened

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Royal College of Nursing says Steve Barclay refused to discuss pay at meeting on Monday; Welsh nurses to strike after last-minute talks fail. This blog is now closed

Pat Cullen, the Royal College of Nursing’s general secretary, told ITV this morning that there was no point talking to Steve Barclay, the health secretary, if he was not prepared to discuss pay. She said

What I’m saying … to the health secretary this morning, is if you don’t want to speak to me directly about nurses’ pay, we have engaged with the conciliation service Acas, they can do that through Acas, but our door is absolutely wide open and it appears at the minute that theirs is totally shut …

Fundamentally, I need to get to a table and talk to them about pay. This isn’t just me, it’s the 320,000 nurses that voted for strike action … They voted through an independent ballot that we carried out and surely to goodness you couldn’t look at one of those people this morning in the eye and say: ‘You’re not worth an extra brown penny’. In my mind they absolutely are.

I think it’s a very challenging international picture. About a third of the world’s economies are predicted to be in recession, either this year or next.

We’re no different in this country and truthfully, it is likely to get worse before it gets better, which makes it even more difficult when we have big public sector strikes going on at the moment.

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Ministers accused of spoiling for a fight with nurses over pay

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While health secretary Steve Barclay says he will not negotiate, unions suggest the compromise reached in Scotland could help avert strikes

Ministers were under intense pressure last night to open new pay talks that could avert a devastating series of NHS strikes as health unions suggested a deal could be struck if both sides were willing to negotiate and compromise.

Amid claims from Labour and from NHS sources that ministers appeared to be playing politics and deliberately “spoiling for a fight”, union leaders strongly suggested that an improved, but still sub-inflation, offer similar to that made to Scottish health unions at the end of last month by the Holyrood government – which has led to strike threats being lifted north of the border – could help break the deadlock elsewhere in the UK.

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Who are the female union leaders overseeing UK strike action?

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Four women at some of the biggest unions are on the frontline of the fight for better pay and conditions

Christina McAnea is the general secretary of Unison, the UK’s biggest union. Brought up on Glasgow’s Drumchapel estate, McAnea left school at 16 to join the civil service, before going to university at the age of 22 and earning a degree in English and history.

A longtime union official, the no-nonsense McAnea has couched Unison’s demands for better pay and conditions for NHS workers, who include paramedics and ambulance staff, as a battle for the future of the health service.

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