Greater Manchester Respect

The day before half a million public sector workers are told they will lose their livelihood and after 100,000 finance workers have already lost their jobs, Les Bayliss, Assistant General Secretary of UNITE, chooses to direct his attack at workers brave enough to resist and fight for a better future – the BA cabin staff. He should be ashamed of himself.

A year ago, Len McCluskey was parachuted into the BA dispute, probably believing it would be a quick victory and a launch pad for his own election ambitions.

UNITE’s leadership, including three of the four candidates in the current General Secretary election who are Assistant Secretaries, has failed to secure the repeal of the laws against trade unions while funding New Labour to the hilt with £ millions of UNITE members money. They were too close, too cosy, paying too much for too little and are collectively responsible for that failure. Tens of millions of people within and outside the union have been left angry and vulnerable as a result.

They feign anger while posturing in the election campaign but no amount of angry words will stop these public service cuts. Only if the unions fight will we stand a chance. In France, the unions have responded magnificently to the assault on pensions. If they can do it there, we can do it here!

It is all very good for Les Bayliss to talk of negotiation when it’s someone else’s pay, pension and job, whilst he and other appointed senior officials face no such threat to their six figure pay packages and jobs for life. Negotiation is always useful but it will not save half a million public sector jobs and it has not stopped the wave of sacking and suspensions of BA workers. How does Les Bayliss propose to negotiate with employers that illegally blacklist 3,200 construction workers?

Willie Walsh’s blatant attempt at union busting has resulted in 14 sacked union members and 70 suspended while on a legal legitimate strike. It has reduced terms, conditions and pay for the BA cabin crews. The outstanding response from cabin crews has not been built upon by the UNITE leadership. It is not the strikes that are disastrous but the failure to extend the action might turn out to be. White flags and retreats send all the wrong signals to bullying bosses.

Instead, Les Bayliss is trying to promote his own ambitions at the expense of thousands of members facing an employer hell-bent on breaking union organization and undermining hard-won rights at work. I don’t think anyone with a huge pay package and an appointed job for life can possibly be fully on the same side or at least in the same boat as their members. This is precisely why I am standing - a member of the union and not an official, free of the infighting and independent of the union’s machine.

Woodley, McCluskey and others are expressing outrage at Bayliss’s latest antics. They could debar Bayliss from the union election for his alleged breach of union protocols and the Data Protection Act. Despite their consternation and for whatever reason, they choose not to do this. I call for him to be censured and removed from the ballot paper.

Jerry Hicks

Lobby Manchester Council 

Town Hall, Manchester
Wednesday 13th October 2010
9.30 am

We want to have as large a lobby of the Manchester Council as possible so please spread the word to those who may not know. We want to send a message to the councillors within Manchester of the widespread anger that there is to the cuts to funding South Manchester Law Centre along with the other Law Centres and immigration advice services.

If the cuts are not overturned, the Manchester Council and Legal Service Commission (LSC) contracts will mean NO LAW CENTRES at all in Manchester.

If the immigration cuts specifically are not overturned, there will be NO PUBLICLY FUNDED IMMIGRATION AND ASYLUM ADVICE services based in the city of Manchester.

The loss of the free legal aid through the South Manchester Law Centre and the Greater Manchester Immigration Aid Unit represents an attack on the most vulnerable within our community. Free legal aid is an essential part of the welfare state. Cuts will hurt the poorest and weakest the most.

Over 200 people came to the Public Meeting in Longsight Pakistani Community Centre on Thursday (7th October) and heard from people who use the services of the Law Centre, including the Somali community, the Sudanese community, local councillors, other referring advice agencies and everyone who has used the Law Centre for the last 35 years.

The message was clear: if the funding bodies truly want local accessible quality services, as they say they do, then they must STOP THESE CUTS NOW.

SAVE THE LAW CENTRE!

What you can do to be involved in the campaign

1. Sign the online petition at
http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/savesouthmanchesterlawcentre/ or take the petition around your workplace. You can download a petition from the South Manchester Law Centre's website ww.smlc.org.uk. Return any petitions to South Manchester Law Centre, 584 Stockport Road, Longsight, Manchester, M13
0RQ

2. Contact your MP or local councilor. You can find your local councilor on this link http://www.manchester.gov.uk/site/scripts/council_democracy_index.php.
You can find your local MP http://www.theyworkforyou.com/.

3. Come to the weekly campaign meetings on Tuesdays and Thursdays at South Manchester Law Centre, 584 Stockport Road at 5.30pm.

Ring 0161 225 5111 for more information - contact Sukhdeep Singh - Sukhdeep@smlc.org.uk - or Paul Morris - pmorris@smlc.org.uk 07831576121

As of the beginning of next week every member of UNITE will receive direct from the union a 'mail shot' containing a six hundred word statement from the four candidates. Though the other three candidates' statement will highlight different things, none of them, say what we do.

They will mention a 'democratic union' but deprive members the chance to choose who represents them by continuing with the appointment system. I believe that a democratic Union includes election of all officials.

They may talk about the crisis and the fat cats that created it, yet none of them will mention how much of our members' money they will gladly pocket if they become General Secretary. I would only take an average wage, living the same lifestyle as that of the members.

They may mention the need to fight for jobs, pay and pension, and they are right but we are shackled with anti union legislation brought in by Thatcher and the Tories left unchanged by Blair, Brown and Labour. Though our union's policy is repeal of those laws, not a finger has been lifted to do it. The other candidates, all currently Assistant General Secretaries, have been part of the leadership that has to shoulder the responsibility of where we find ourselves now. Angry and vulnerable and in need of something very different.

I say that when the need is so great, when the occasion requires, when something is so obviously wrong we must confront the anti union laws head on.

Please email jerryhicks4gs2010@yahoo.co.uk for copies of the leaflet with an address to send them and how many you need. Then take them to every High Street bank and every Bus driver, we have members in every hospital and local council. Plus the factories and..... well you will find them.

A member led, member controlled 'Unite'. Lets get the union back to hand it back!

Jerry Hicks