Fighting fund to beat the cuts

UNISON will set up a special fighting fund to campaign and organise against the coalition government's cuts agenda, the national executive council agreed today.General secretary Dave Prentis said: "This is the biggest challenge our union has faced."The government has made a political choice to take a sledgehammer to our public services and to slash spending. UNISON is determined to show that there is an alternative to this vicious cuts agenda."It is not just a question of public service workers – just as many private sector jobs are at risk, and every single family will be affected by cuts to our vital local services."But this is our core work – it is the reason our union is here: to defend our members; to organise and to campaign for public services. This fighting fund will support our local branches and regions in the campaign over the next five years."The NEC heard a wide ranging report on the campaigning, organising and mobilising work the union has carried out over the summer under the Million Voices for Public Services banner.This included political interventions at the party conferences and in local elections; providing a range of communications and campaign support tools for local activists; mobilising campaign activity around the regions to support the ETUC day of action and gearing up for the TUC lobby and rally of Parliament on 19 October, the eve of the coalition government’s comprehensive spending review announcement.During autumn, the union will build a series of local campaigns across the UK that inspire and engage activists and members in alliance with PCS and other unions, service users and community groups leading up to the TUC national demonstration in March 2011 and the elections in May.The executive also heard that:
UNISON is recruiting well, with this year showing the strongest August recruitment rate for seven years;
with inflation running at up 5%, members are increasingly facing a real-terms pay cut as employers seek to impose pay freezes. Negotiation and organising around pay is continuing in all sectors;
UNISON has launched a major campaign against government proposals to restructure the NHS and has sought a judicial review;
equal pay continues to be a major issue for the union. An increasing number of settlements are being agreed with employers and a number of long-running cases are due to settle in the near future;
the presidential charity for the year will be a Make a Child Smile scheme, which is administered by UNISON Welfare. Regions and branches will be encouraged to raise funds to take children from disadvantaged families on days out to give them a day to remember;
the NEC agreed to send best wishes to Swindon local government branch, which is taking industrial action against employer proposals remove unsocial hours payments.