On 1&2 June, Barnet council workers will take further strike action against Barnet council’s highly unpopular plans to outsource even more council services.
The workers facing privatisation include: coach escorts, drivers, social workers, occupational therapists, library workers, children and family centre workers, street cleaning and refuse workers – all of whom have made it clear they want to remain employees of the council.
UNISON Branch Secretary John Burgess said: “This dispute is all about how strongly our members feel about wanting to remain council employees. They don’t want to work for big multi nationals who will quickly dump the staff to another contractor if they are not making enough profit, which appears to be happening to 3,000 workers in Staffordshire. They don’t want to work for a company that won’t pay the London Living Wage. They don’t want to work for a company that uses zero hours contracts. They don’t want to work for a company that will take jobs out of the community they serve. They want to work for Barnet Council and remain directly accountable to the residents of Barnet.
“One of our members has written and produced a music campaign video called “The easyCouncil Loco-motion” which pretty much sums up the mood of our members:”
People have been in touch on twitter re: the photos I’ve been posting of mould in a Northwest London flat where a man with learning difficulties has been living:
Mould in doorway entrance
Thought I’d put up a short post with more detail as people wanted to know if the problem had been reported, etc, and what could be done. I also thought this was a good opportunity to make a few pertinent points about the people who have taken the real kicking in austerity – and the abject failure of mainstream politics to acknowledge those people or that kicking as we head into the election.
On notifying the council – I reported the mould and this flat to Brent Council a couple of weeks ago on 27 March after visiting the flat. I was shocked by the state of the place then – you can read about that here. The council rang back a few days later with an inspection appointment date for yesterday. As reported here, the man in that flat is also being evicted from it, just to add to his problems. The Kilburn Unemployed Workers’ Group (who have made an amazing effort to try and sort things out for this bloke) helped him make a homelessness application a few weeks ago and have been ringing landlords and agents all over the place to find someone who will accept a housing benefit tenant. A member of the group was even ringing agents yesterday when we were at the flat waiting for the council officer to arrive for the flat inspection (I took the pictures you see in this post yesterday). Hopefully, this part of the situation will be resolved soon and this man will have a new place to live.
A few extra points, though.
I want people to understand what a collection of disasters people in these situations must deal with. These sorts of things must be happening to people in similar situations all over the place. When the council bloke inspected the flat yesterday, he said that the worst mould – the thick mould on the entrance ceiling in the photo above – could be the result of a water leak problem of some kind upstairs and that the council would instruct the landlord to investigate. The mould round the doors, however, was more likely to do with ventilation problems – the (one) door not being left open often enough, moisture being trapped in the flat and so on. But this is the thing. There are so many problems that have led to this situation and they all have to do with not having enough money. That’s probably an incredibly patronising thing to say, but I’m saying it all the same. Continue reading →
People who follow me on twitter will know that on Thursday, I joined Independent Living Fund recipient Mary Laver and her personal assistants, Mirror journalist Ros Wynne-Jones and Green party members and supporters as Mary travelled all the way from Westminster to Chingford in her wheelchair to protest at the government’s plan to close the ILF. The ILF is used by profoundly disabled people to pay for the extra carer hours that they need to lead independent lives.
That walk to Chingford was a good effort – took us nearly nine hours. Ouch. Respect to all concerned.
Without the ILF, a lot of disabled people will be in a very bad place. They’ll rely on councils to provide those extra care hours – councils that can’t meet demand for care as it is. Funding will be devolved to councils, but only for a limited time, and there are no plans to ringfence the devolved money at many councils.
A few photos from the march to Chingford:
Preparing to leave Westminster at 7.30am
Meeting with fellow ILF recipient Sophie Partridge at Kings Cross station
“We’re in court this morning fighting Annington Homes for our right to housing! They are not only demanding we leave our homes, but also trying to obtain an injunction to prevent us protesting on the estate.”
Come and show your support this morning (Monday 30 March):
9.30am
Barnet County Court, St Mary’s Court,
Regents Park Road, London N3 1BQ
Update 27 March: the state of this flat has been reported to Brent council. They said they will arrange an inspection.
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Look at the mould here:
This is a picture from the tiny “studio” flat currently occupied by Eddie (name changed), the 51-year-old man with learning difficulties I’ve been attending jobcentre meetings with. He’s being evicted from this place – a couple of us went with him to Brent council on Monday to start his homelessness application. Eviction or not, he needs to get out of this room fast. I understand that the council is organising properties for him to look at. He may end up out of the borough.
God only knows how many other people are living in places like this. Here’s the mould on the ceiling in the little entrance-bay in the flat:
This studio flat is purely revolting. It’s very small – there’s a bed and a small, filthy kitchen all shoved into one room, with a shower and toilet sort of clipped on at the back. There are mice. There are cockroaches. The mould you can see in the pictures. I took the pictures today when I went to meet Eddie to walk to his jobcentre signon appointment.
But here’s the thing. Eddie’s landlord is collecting £1000 a month in housing benefit for this place. I’ve seen Eddie’s housing benefit settlement papers for this year – £250 a week, which his papers confirm is paid to the landlord. Remember this next time you hear George Osborne yapping on about scroungers. It ain’t guys like Eddie who are taking the piss with their miserable weekly jobseekers’ allowances of about £71. The people who are having a very big laugh on the taxpayer are the landlords who hoover up thousands of pounds in housing benefit for crapholes like you see here. This is the kind of mould that causes serious health problems, surely. The air was rotten. I couldn’t wait to get out of the place. But there we are. This is the kind of environment that is considered perfectly acceptable for people with learning difficulties in our day and age.
Brent council has been in contact on twitter about the photos of the mould that I tweeted, so I’ll be sending a complaint and the photos through. This landlord needs to be taken out of circulation. He’s evicting Eddie and God knows what his plans are next for this flat. I suppose he could decide to put a family with very small children in this place to live with this mould. He could pick someone else on housing benefit who has no choice except to live like this. Who knows.
From the Sweets Way campaign: support tomorrow morning if you can: Monday, March 23, 2015, 09:30, Barnet County Court – St Marys Court, Regents Park Rd, London N3 1BQ
Two weeks into a political occupation that has expanded from one to six homes on the Sweets Way Estate in Barnet, occupiers and residents will be going to court to challenge the replacement of perfectly good and truly affordable homes, with yet more luxury new builds.
Following the delivery of court papers, late in the afternoon on Thursday, March 19, residents, ex-residents and supporters of the Sweets Way Resists campaign will be going to Barnet County Court against private property developers Annington Homes on Monday, 23 March, at 10:00am. The campaign aims to challenge the legal processes used by Annington against the estate’s remaining residents, as well as those involved in the political occupation of 60 Sweets Way, during the company’s attempts to bulldoze the estate.
Supporters and families will also be gathering outside of the courts to stand in solidarity with those fighting the social cleansing of Sweets Way on the inside. Families and activists will be available to share their stories with the media. Continue reading →
Today Barnet Unison opened a strike ballot as part of its dispute with Barnet council to keep staff in council employment.
The ballot is a direct response to five commissioning projects agreed at a 3 March council meeting. The projects would mean outsourcing the majority of the workforce into a variety of alternative delivery models.
At the now-infamous 3 March council meeting (the mayor apparently stuffed his vote up and protestors broke up the meeting) the Conservative Administration voted through a decision to explore “other options” for directly delivering council services. The services are Libraries, Adults & Communities, Children’s Centres, Street Scene services and Education & Skills and School Meals.
UNISON estimates that this will mean upwards of 80% of the workforce will end up working for a different employer. According to a recent Barnet Council committee report, there are only 1,466 directly employed permanent staff.
Unison Branch Secretary John Burgess said:
“In December 2014, our branch conducted a poll of our members which produced the following feedback. 87% of our members want to remain employees of the London Borough of Barnet. 61% of our members said as a result of knowing they could be outsourced they are seriously looking to find employment elsewhere; 96% of our members expressed concern about being outsourced and 81% of members said morale was bad in their workforce. Feedback from the Poll and subsequent UNISON meetings reconfirms our members wish to remain Council employees which is why we are recommending a Yes vote in our strike ballot.”
Unison members who are careworkers for the outsourced Barnet care company Your Choice Barnet (YCB) will take further strike action this week in protest at the harsh 9.5% pay cut imposed on them by their employer. The strike dates are 24 and 25 February.
“The driving motivation for our members in this dispute is their fears about what is happening to the quality of services. Low pay in the care sector does not deliver high quality services. It does not appear to work for Capita, we are at a loss as to understand why this would work for care workers in YCB.”
Barnet Unison says the council has clearly been giving preferential treatment to its private contractors with the news of Capita has already received £110 million in the first 16 months of the two contracts. If YCB were to receive this, it would carry on producing a service to the residents on the scale it does for the next 18 years with no pay cut to staff!
24 & 25 February picket line details
Flower Lane Day Centre
41 Flower Lane
Barnet
London NW7 2JN
Rosa Morrison Day Centre
83 Gloucester Road
Totteridge
Barnet
London EN5 1NA
