Category Archives: Trade unions

Labour must ‘give people something to vote for’, says Unite head

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Sharon Graham, of UK’s second largest union, says party lacks ambition and is not showing itself as distinct alternative to Tories

Labour should “talk about what they can do to change Britain”, the leader of the UK’s second largest trade union has said.

Sharon Graham, the general secretary of Unite, said the union could reduce the amount of money it gave to Labour if the party’s leadership did not back more of its policy priorities, saying “people want something to vote for”.

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Minister calls for pay offer to be taken ‘seriously’ as doctors in England strike

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Health unions suggest industrial action likely to continue as Gillian Keegan defends 6% rise on the table

A senior cabinet minister has urged health unions to take the government’s pay offer “seriously”, after union bosses warned the proposed deal would drive doctors out of the profession and could lead to further strikes.

Gillian Keegan, the education secretary, defended the offer of a 6% pay rise for junior doctors a day after the government accepted the recommendations of the public sector pay review bodies.

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Rishi Sunak driving doctors out of NHS with pay offer, say union leaders

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Public service workers in England offered 5%-7% rises but departments must fund them from existing budgets

Health union leaders have reacted furiously to a warning from Rishi Sunak that his offer of a 6% pay rise this year was final and that “no amount of strikes” would change his mind, as they began their longest walkout yet in England.

The British Medical Association said the government was “driving doctors away” from the health service and had missed an opportunity to put a credible pay offer on the table to end strikes when it accepted all the recommendations of the pay review bodies.

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Teachers in England vote for strike action in autumn over pay

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Members of NASUWT give ‘largest mandate in a decade’ for action over pay, workload and working hours

Members of the NASUWT teachers’ union have voted in favour of industrial action over pay and workload, raising the prospect of mass strikes and widespread disruption across schools in England this autumn.

After months of stalemate with no progress over teachers’ pay, NASUWT members voted decisively for industrial action, with 88.5% of eligible members voting to support strike action and 94.3% supporting action short of strike.

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Starmer put ‘on notice’ by Unite leader after vote to retain ties with Labour

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General secretary of union says party should not treat outcome as ‘blank cheque’ as rift remains with leadership

Keir Starmer has been put “on notice” by the leader of Britain’s biggest trade union, who said that its support should not be treated as a “blank cheque”.

Sharon Graham, the general secretary of Unite, signalled a rift remained with the Labour leadership despite delegates voting to remain affiliated with the party.

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English teaching unions to strike during Tory conference if pay deal rejected

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Action could be directed at Rishi Sunak’s keynote speech, seen as vital in run-up to general election campaign

Teachers are preparing to target Rishi Sunak’s make-or-break Tory conference speech with strike action this autumn, amid growing cabinet support for a compromise to end months of public sector walkouts.

Should ministers fail to support a deal that would hand teachers a 6.5% increase this year, all major teaching unions in England are increasingly confident that their members will back more strikes when the new school year begins.

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London Underground staff to take week of industrial action at end of July

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‘Rolling action’ by RMT members between 23 and 28 July likely to cause widespread disruption across capital

London Underground staff will take industrial action over a week at the end of July, spelling widespread transport disruption in the capital.

Members of the RMT union will take “rolling action” between Sunday 23 July and Friday 28 July. The RMT said there would be no strike on Monday 24, with staff in different sections and grades halting work on different shifts on each of the other days.

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Striking teachers in England accused of undermining pupils’ pandemic recovery

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Gillian Keegan says she ‘can’t think of a worse time’ for action by NEU members

The education secretary, Gillian Keegan, has accused striking teachers of undermining children’s recovery from the Covid pandemic, saying she did “pretty well” at winning extra funding for schools from the Treasury.

Keegan told a conference in Bournemouth: “Let me be clear, we should not be having these strikes in general, but certainly not now. Children have been through so much in the pandemic and I can’t think of a worse time to be willingly keeping them out of school.”

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Marking boycott may delay degrees of more than 1,000 Durham students

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University says about 20% of final year students will be unable to graduate if industrial action continues

More than 1,000 final year students at Durham University could be left without a degree this summer because of the marking boycott disrupting universities across the UK.

Durham, one of 145 universities affected by the industrial action over pay and working conditions called by the University and College Union (UCU), said about 20% of its 5,300 final year students would be unable to graduate.

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Union fury at reports Sunak might overrule some public sector pay rises

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Recommendations from independent pay review bodies could be rejected by PM if he deems them unaffordable

Unions have expressed outrage over reports the prime minister plans to block public sector wage increases owing to fears about pushing up UK inflation, which remains worse than in other leading economies.

Recommendations from the independent pay review bodies could be overruled by Rishi Sunak if they are considered unaffordable, the Times reported, because of concerns they could set off a “wage-price spiral”.

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NHS nurses strike in England could reach ‘end of the road’ this week

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Royal College of Nursing raises doubts over whether enough members will get postal votes in on time

The rolling strikes by NHS nurses could “hit the end of the road” this week as the leader of the Royal College of Nursing raised doubts over whether sufficient numbers of members would get their postal votes in on time.

The RCN union’s ballot on further industrial action in England will close on 23 June but its general secretary, Pat Cullen, has for the first time suggested an affirmative result is in doubt.

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UK strikes laws must conform with international rules, says UN agency

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Intervention by International Labour Organization ‘hugely embarrassing’ for government, says TUC

The UN’s labour standards body has told the UK government it must make changes to highly controversial new strikes laws, which critics say threaten the fundamental rights of British workers.

The International Labour Organization (ILO), a UN agency, said the UK needed to “ensure that existing and prospective legislation is in conformity” with international rules on freedom of association, and added that the government must seek technical assistance from the agency’s experts.

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Ofsted school inspection reforms ‘nowhere near enough’

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Sister of Ruth Perry, who killed herself after her primary was downgraded, ‘disappointed’ single-word judgments not removed

Changes by Ofsted to the way it inspects schools have been criticised as “nowhere near enough” to reduce the resulting high levels of stress involved, which were linked to the recent death of a popular headteacher.

The reforms announced by Amanda Spielman, Ofsted’s chief inspector, are intended to ease the burden felt by school leaders such as Ruth Perry, 53, the head of a primary in Reading who killed herself earlier this year after an Ofsted inspection lowered her school’s grade from “outstanding” to “inadequate”.

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Record numbers of teachers in England quitting profession, figures show

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Department for Education survey finds that 40,000 – almost 9% of workforce – left state schools in 2021-22 before retirement

Teachers in England are abandoning their profession in record numbers, according to official figures, with Labour claiming that “incompetent” government policies were to blame.

The latest workforce survey by the Department for Education (DfE) found that 40,000 teachers left state schools last year – almost 9% of the teaching workforce, and the highest number since it began publishing the data in 2011 – while a further 4,000 retired.

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Covid inquiry reveals fresh battle for release of government messages – UK politics live

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Lawyer for Covid inquiry announces ‘regrettable’ delays in handing over of information by government

Q: What would the minimum wage for workers be under your fair pay agreement for care workers? (See 10.47am.)

Starmer says his sister is a care worker. He knows how hard the job is.

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Keir Starmer pledges ‘good, union jobs’ amid energy row with GMB

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Labour leader to address union’s conference after its leader attacks plan to ban new North Sea oil and gas extraction

Keir Starmer will pledge to put “good, union jobs” at the heart of Labour’s energy policy during a speech to one of its biggest donor unions after its general secretary criticised a proposed ban on oil and gas expansion.

He will speak at the GMB’s annual conference on Tuesday, a day after he tried to calm a growing rift with its leadership over Labour’s energy policy.

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Blocking Jamie Driscoll as Labour’s mayoral candidate is ‘error’, says Unite

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Mayor of North of Tyne was told on Friday he is not on the longlist to be party’s candidate for North East

The Labour party’s decision to exclude a sitting Labour mayor from contesting a forthcoming mayoral contest has been described as a “major error” by Unite, the UK’s leading trade union.

Jamie Driscoll – often described as “the last Corbynista in power” since becoming the first mayor for North of Tyne since 2019 – learned on Friday that he had not made the longlist to be Labour’s mayoral candidate for the new north-east region.

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Labour needs an ‘honest debate’ about Brexit damage, union warns

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Unless Britain develops a closer relationship with the EU it will continue to haemorrhage investment and jobs, says the GMB

The leader of one of the country’s biggest unions has urged Labour to conduct an “honest debate” about the economic damage being caused to working people by Brexit, as evidence grows that it is fuelling inflation and driving jobs and investment abroad.

In an interview with the Observer, Gary Smith, the general secretary of the GMB union, which is one of Labour’s biggest financial backers, giving more than £1m a year, said politicians of all parties had been too afraid to admit the adverse consequences that leaving the EU was having on jobs and life in working communities.

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Train drivers’ 24-hour strike stops rail services in England

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About 40% of services expected to run on Saturday as 12,000 Aslef members hold second day of industrial action this week

Rail services across England have again come to a halt as 12,000 train drivers strike for the second time this week amid a long-running dispute with the operating companies over pay and conditions.

Members of the drivers’ union Aslef are walking out for 24 hours on the majority of lines in England and some cross-border routes into Scotland and Wales, leaving only 40% of services running.

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Heathrow security guards expected to announce fresh strikes

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Unite says it will serve notice to airport of fresh round of strikes in long-running pay dispute

Fresh strikes by security guards at Heathrow airport are expected to be announced next week.

Members of Unite are embroiled in a long-running dispute over pay which has led to previous industrial action.

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