The Unite union have rejected the government’s latest NHS worker pay offer of a 5% pay rise, following the Royal College of Nursing doing the same last week. Although the High Court ruled yesterday that the one of RCN’s planned upcoming strike was unlawful…
Unite mainly represents ambulance drivers and junior health staff workers. Unite’s Onay Kasab told Sky News this morning:
“This is sending a clear message to the government. The pay offer is inadequate. It doesn’t deal with the pay crisis and it doesn’t deal with the general crisis that is taking place in the NHS.”
The GMB union is also set to release the results of its membership ballot this afternoon. They’re expected to back the government’s offer. Stay tuned…
The parliamentary branch of Unite has agreed to begin the process of balloting to strike. As Guido previously reported, the branch represents primarily Labour MP staff, and is essentially an admission that their left-wing strike-supporting bosses are themselves underpaying staff when they decide to allocate their expenses budget.
One of the largest branch meetings in our history today met and agreed to begin the process of balloting to strike.@ipsaUK have the power to prevent this from happening but have failed to meaningfully negotiate pic.twitter.com/tTAoTQmVBF
— Parliamentary Staff Branch (@unitepsbranch) February 2, 2023
The union is demanding RPI + 2%, meaning an 11% pay rise…
As Labour bask in the chaos of public sector workers’ strikes, they should be careful what they wish for. It appears strike fever has reached their own backyard as their own parliamentary staff are threatening a strike over an unacceptably small pay offer.
This afternoon the Unite Parliamentary Staff branch announced that the 4.9% pay increase approved for them is “grossly inadequate” and “well below the 6.9% average wage increases in the private sector”. Ignoring the fact private sector workers don’t have half the job security, expenses or subsidised food and drink…
With no consultation from @CommonsSpeaker or @ipsaUK on our pay increase, our branch will now be exploring options for industrial action. pic.twitter.com/jGnMbu0hbY
— Parliamentary Staff Branch (@unitepsbranch) January 25, 2023
Unfortunately for Labour, Guido understands the Unite parliamentary branch is almost exclusively the refuge of their own staffers and is unlikely to hurt Tory MPs. While staffers would receive the 4.9% automatically, there’s nothing to stop MPs supplementing that with additional pay rises if they have a few quid lying around in their budget…
Two of Labour MP Grahame Morris‘s staffers have endorsed the threat of strike action, clearly dissatisfied that their own lefty boss won’t increase their pay.
Liverpool councillor and senior caseworker to Mick Whitley MP, Elizabeth Hayden, has slammed the low pay being handed out, saying she can’t wait to vote for industrial action if and when the ballot hits. For the record that’s the same Elizabeth Hayden who once questioned whether the Manchester Arena attack was a Tory false flag attack*…
Among other staffers appearing to endorse the strike action are two working for SNP MPs, a Taiwo Owatemi staffer and a Christian Wakeford staffer. He’ll soon be regretting crossing to Labour as his casework begins to pile up…
*Questions about why an MP has her on the books is an entirely different matter…
In December Len McCluskey was forced to welcome a QC-led inquiry into his Unite hotel pet project, which cost members a whopping £98 million. Only slightly above the £7 million it was supposed to cost…
He may not welcome new figures revealed by The Huffington Post today that two evaluations of the lavish pad have estimated its worth at just £29 million. This figure was actually from a second evaluation, after the first concluded it to be worth a mere £27 million. To put it simply, Len’s lost £70 million…
HuffPo discovered the figures after Sharon Graham – Len’s replacement – revealed them on a call with Unite officials, one of whom expressed the group’s shock at the disastrous evaluation. Back in September McCluskey told Sky News that they were the “only one who’s interested” in the story – Guido has a feeling that evaluation was pretty far off the mark…
Earlier this month Unite announced it is to cut its funding to Labour due to believing money would be better spent on union campaigns. That was what their newly elected leader, Sharon Graham, claimed. Since 2017 Unite membership fees have been plunged into Len McCluskey’s hotel and conference centre vanity project in Birmingham. It was supposed to cost £7 million, however ballooned to an eye-watering £98 million…
Last night Sharon Graham confirmed there would be a transparent, QC-led inquiry into the building of it, which has also had questions surrounding the fact the development’s main construction contract – worth £95 million – was awarded to a mate of Len McCluskey.
Despite Len telling Sky News back in September that “it’s a fantastic investment and [Sky’s] the only one who is interested in that any more”, Graham’s admitted there are questions that “need to be answered in a timely fashion”.
“to ensure transparency the outcome of the inquiry will be made public.
“I will also be doing everything possible to recover all monies due back to the union.”
Last night he tweeted an inquiry was “sensible and will answer any questions”. Unfortunately for any Unite members hoping to hold McCluskey to account, he’s already checked out…
Breaking news from the Information Commissioner who’s just fined Unite the Union £45,000 for making tens of thousands of calls to telephone numbers registered with the TPS service. They say their advice was either “ignored or not acted upon”.
Unite was reported to the commissioner in January 2020 after complaints were made about unsolicited direct marketing calls, despite being registered with the Telephone Preference Service, a free opt out service enabling individuals to no longer receive unsolicited sales or marketing calls. In total 27 complaints were made against the union.
In total they found 57,665 calls made to TPs registered numbers, out of a total 726,853 calls made that connected. Guido’s sure Unite will have no problem finding £45,000 down the back of their sofa…
Read the report below:
