From Unison East Midlands:

One to watch on Thursday this week –

“Members at Notts County Unison have voted to take strike action in defence of jobs and services. The one day strike is planned for 24 February, the day that the full council meets to set the budget.”

Of particular interest here is the fact that the union wrote to Notts county council and showed where the council could make £26m in savings. It seems that letter was ignored. The union takes this to mean that cuts at Notts are ideological, as opposed to judicious:

“We are left to draw the conclusion that the current budget position may be a deliberate misrepresentation taken for party political reasons, with the aim of building up a “slush fund” to reduce council tax before the next county council elections. Of course, we may be wrong about this and we would be grateful for written confirmation that the council does not intend to do this.”

About 1400 jobs are due to be lost at Notts county to meet a grants cut of £25m. Could be an interesting scene if strikers (a group which will doubtless include many of the 1000 or so people in line for compulsory redundancy) turn up to protest at the Town Hall.

This is the alternative budget Unison presented to the council (PDF 1.8MB)