UNISON: Local Government Pay Freeze demonstrates the need for a democratic fighting union By UNISON Socialist Appeal Supporters. Saturday, 23 January 2010

 It won’t come as a big surprise to most thinking workers that a bunch of Tory councillors sat around and made the decision to institute a pay freeze in local government. No surprise that is because the memory of Thatcherism is still etched on many workers minds and secondly because with New Labour already advocating a 1% pay ceiling on public sector pay, how were the Tories going to out do them? Why, by offering less of course!
 
As the UNISON press release points out:

“The employer’s decision to cut our members' pay without negotiation is a slap in the face for hard working council employees who have kept local communities together through the crisis.
 
“Two thirds already earn less than £18k a year. Last year George Osborne, Tory shadow chancellor said the Tories would not freeze pay for those earning in this pay bracket, now the Tory LGA is doing just that.
 
“Our members are already covering posts left vacant by wide-spread redundancies. 75% of the workforce are women so this is an outright attack on women's pay. "
 
“We know that councils can afford an increase. Council reserves have grown, while many have chosen to cut their own income by freezing council tax. Our members will be outraged by this threatened pay freeze. "

We would add that the whole question of a pay freeze in local government is nothing more than the council workers being presented with the bill for the bail out of the banks. It’s a prime example of double standards, we can pay the bill for a bunch of speculators and parasites. The Tories are the ones firing the bullets through their control of the Local Government Association, but Messrs Darling and Brown supplied the ammunition by advocating a pay freeze in the first place.

UNISON, UNITE and the GMB have submitted a claim for 2.5% or £500. It’s obvious from the employers response that to get anywhere near this figure we will need to be prepared to fight. The role of the leadership will be vital in achieving a decent pay rise. That means unity in action from all the unions. But it also raises the stakes in the forthcoming General Secretary Election in UNISON which was announced on January 20th.
 
For a fighting democratic UNISON
 
UNISON is the biggest union in the sector, for many years now the leadership of the union have been “holding the line” for Blair and Brown, given the possibility of a Tory government, the union leaders are likely to want to reposition themselves. How much of a difference that will make to the pay campaign and the rest of the union’s work depends on whether they feel the hot breath of the hundreds of thousands of members at their heels.
 
So, there is a lot of work to do in the unions to argue against the pay freeze and also to identify a credible left candidate prepared to fight a non sectarian campaign for a fighting and democratic UNISON. A genuine socialist leadership in UNISON would make a huge step forward in terms of fighting the pay freeze. But it would also fight politically to transform the Labour Party. The right wing are utterly discredited and they will come under enormous pressure after an election defeat.