Students and workers unite

On Wed 19th, whilst students were out protesting against the abolition of EMA, UNISON's Higher Education Service Group Executive, which is made up of regional Higher Education reps and our two NEC reps, came to the consensus that we should pass the following motion:

"It is proposed that UNSION's national HESGE supports the National Campaign Against Fees and Cuts demonstration in London on the 29th January in addition to the TUC demonstration in Manchester."

Whilst this is only a small step forward, it's a good sign, showing that we are actively going to support the students movement even if they don't have the official backing of the TUC or indeed the NUS.

My branch had already passed a motion to build for this demo, and I expect most other London and south branches will want to do the same. As I've argued already, it's crucial that we stand shoulder to shoulder with students as they continue to lead the fight against fees and cuts. So, I'll see you in London on the 29th.

December NEC report: Max Watson - HE Gen Seat

December NEC report: Max Watson

These are my notes on the National Executive Council (NEC) meeting held in December – my first meeting as UNISON’s HE General Seat Rep. Another NEC member has lead the way in reporting regularly to members from the NEC and I agree it’s important to do this in terms of democratic accountability. Apologies it’s so late (and too long) – I aim to refine these and type them quicker in future.

Fighting against the cuts

"We need to be bolder and more radical in the way we oppose the cuts, raising our profile and showing real leadership," concluded a report from our General Secretary titled "defending our members – defending public services," which was adopted by the NEC meeting in London.

What followed was a long debate, and we could all agree that a £10M fighting fund was a good thing to publicize in a press release and sends a strong message to our members (although it’s a drop in the ocean to the bankers in the city and their politician friends, as one member pointed out). Another member pointed out we also have another £10M in the Industrial Action fund, so the total was doubled to £20M.

Students of the world ignite!
The mood was also for maximum unity with the students, although in the end a letter sent to the NUS President would probably not have electrified the 40-odd campuses that were in occupation at the time.

“Students are in a beautiful position – they can call out students quickly, with no need to ballot, they’re in the position we were in during the 1980s,” lamented Dave. The problem for those students is, the NUS was not calling students out from colleges and schools, in fact the NUS was not endorsing the student actions, led by the Campaign Against Fees and Cuts and the EAN. Their actions were the equivalent of unofficial wild-cat strikes without sanction from the national union. No wonder some students’ unions have been calling for a vote of no confidence in Aaron Porter.

Most delegates pointed out how their local university had been in occupation, or had walked out or had an inspiring demo of some kind, and when Jon Rogers suggested we go to visit UCL at lunch time to show some solidarity (just round the corner) I of course supported this by voting with my feet later on. In terms of urgency, I have to say the debates inside the occupation at London Met (and elsewhere) were much more determined, urgent, and less fearful of the catastrophe we’re about to face and more angry instead. And certainly more radical, more bold – as we really do need to be...

The NEC had also agreed to support the TUC national rally for young people in Manchester – by that time an indoor rally. Now that the students’ movement have called a national demo in London on the same day, some of us are torn between the two. So tomorrow I’ll be proposing to UNISON’s Higher Education Service Group that, just like other key TUC-affiliated unions , we should support both the students’ demo in London and the TUC-organised rally in Manchester.

Paul Holmes compared the mood to 1979, and I’ve already pointed out, 1968 is a more pertinent comparison for the students right now, though it remains to be seen if the student uprising of 2010 will be followed by the necessary waves of strike action in 2011.

National TUC demonstration March 26th
For trade unionists, all roads will lead to London on 26^th March (unless a monarch decides to get married, of course, in which case we must cancel everything). All action from now on should be geared around mobilising for this event, and all stewards should commit to getting there. There was the inevitable complaints about this being ‘too little too late’ from some on the left, but now this is what we’ve got to work with we’re all agreed we need to build for it. My branch already has posters up and leaflets on the way, and we intend to blitz the campus and plan to go all out for building this one. Go to UNISON's website to help building for this demo.

Alliances with PCS & NUT
The NUT is balloting over pensions and looking to coordinate with other public sector unions, so some members want to know why we’re not doing the same (we’d not been formally approached was the disappointing answer). Further working relationships with the PCS are also being developed - see UNISON's press pack here and the full joint statement here PCS's website here.

Fighting as Citizens, not just workers
One northern member talked about the importance of organising not only as workers but as ‘citizens’, with community groups and as ‘service users’, in an alliance against the cuts. The Citizens Forum (our branch recently affiliated to London Citizens – more on this another time) had recently launched in Nottingham with UNISON aiming to work closely with them.

Saving for a rainy day
Another member, highlighted the huge amount of money still in some local government branch reserves, and that we need to spend that money saved up for a ‘rainy day’ (it’s chucking it down, after all). The chances of forcing branches to part with their hard earned money via a motion at National Delegates' Conference was laughed at but I’m not sure if a cap on branch savings can’t be thought through.

As our treasurer will confirm, I’m a big believer in spending our way out of a crisis, and in our branch it’s paying dividends (massively increased visibility, full comp of activists, an increasing membership, high profile campaigns). So I’m always astonished at how much some branches keep earning the interest. That money must be spent on the highest profile campaign against these cuts we’ve ever seen.

Variations across the borders
The Welsh Assembly, one member reminded us, had chosen not to increase fees, and committed to paying for Welsh students to study in England, whilst the Scottish TUC appear to be gearing up for a one day public sector strike: if they can do it, why can’t we?

Public Sector Pay Negotiations
A report on pay was received. In HE we’ve been offered 0.4% and most branches agreed to accept this, though other unions are in dispute. It’s frustrating when your branch has successfully mobilised a ‘reject’ vote, as ours did, and you have to tell your members that we lost the vote nationally. A discussion followed about local bargaining and whether or not any public sector institutions that had broken with national bargaining had offered higher than elsewhere. They have not, and we remain opposed to local bargaining despite the national pay freeze being imposed.

Public Sector Pensions Commission
The debate on Pensions revealed the clear difference between those who want to coordinate action with other unions over this, and those are in the ‘not yet’ camp. The argument was that we must wait and see what the Hutton report actually says before we can begin to talk about strike action.

In my mind we’ve already had our pensions attacked and it is very clear Hutton is expected to recommend much worse – our pensions have already been attacked by pegging them to the Consumer Price Index instead of the Retail Price Index. We should also expect to face a recommendation of higher contributions, for longer working lives, and less money paid to us as pensions at the end of it, and probably not paid based on our final salary.

We must gear up now for that fight. And it’s true we do also need to educate our members about these attacks on our deferred wages, or we’ll get a confused ‘why bother’ vote in a ballot. To that end, a model letter to send to MPs, and a model letter to educate members was being produced. Got to start somewhere, I suppose.

Organising Update
One in four new members – and nearly all regions are growing above their turnover rate – are joining online. What does this mean? More and more people do everyday things on the internet? Workers, anxious about their jobs in the public sector, come across our website advertised in billboards in the street or in magazines and even on Youtube, so they join up that way? It’s great that it’s ‘easy to join online’, except this probably means around a quarter of new members aren’t joining via face-to-face contact with stewards.

Rather than become internet fetishists we must be aware of its pitfalls too. I’m a big user of social media as a networking tool – as those who follow my blog already know – and I do like to try my hand at new-fangled communication software (eg Twitter, Facebook etc). But we cannot let this be a substitute for one-to-one talks, whether it’s walking the corridors to talk to the shop floor about the mood, or meeting up in an office over a coffee not in a ‘chat room’.

Every membership form completed online should be followed up with a steward visiting that member to introduce them to the union as an organic, human organisation which values their input.

Swindon Fights Back
UNISON members in Swindon had been on strike for 6 weeks against cuts, and their strike action was beginning to escalate by the time we met. The NEC agreed to send a message of support. I know what a difference official support can mean for a strike, so I hope this at least helped boost morale.

UNISON Objectives
We then briefly discussed the following as our objectives summarised by the following bullet points:

• Meet the recruitment and organising challenge posed by austerity measures, including public spending cuts and increased outsourcing
  
  
• Protect and secure decent employment, pay and pensions for UNISON members, promoting equality and challenging discrimination
  
  
• Develop our Million Voices campaign in support of quality public services, building our political influence and forging alliances with unions and community organisations
  
  
• Ensure that the union’s information and communications infrastructure and internal management systems are efficient and effective to meet the changing needs of our membership.

Other items

We also heard that UNISON is following up the union-bashing ‘Dispatches’ programme, and celebrated the Million Voices Campaign won a prestigious advertising award (congrats).

After the NEC meeting

As others went off down the road to UCL’s student occupation in the leafy Russell Square area, I headed back up to Holloway Road to catch Alabama 3 and Lowkey at London Met's occupation. .

I was surprised at how quickly it was all over, before lunch – and at the fact I hadn’t spoken. Those who know me as an activist and in life – in my branch and beyond – will confirm it’s a rare thing for me to keep my gob shut. I’d decided to soak it all up, to get a feel and to learn the ropes. That shouldn’t last too long.

Please feel free to pass this on to others in the union, feed back your comments, thoughts and so on. Get in touch, use this blog for your own organising purposes.

Students Xmas Carol and Xmas solidarity greetings

I sent this round to our branch recently and found it also on Jon Roger's blog here. Good luck, comrade, in your branch's fight against cuts in the new year. Good luck also to Paul Holmes with the five day strike at Kirklees council, also against job cuts, in the new year. I hope everyone has a well deserved break: Eat, drink, be merry, and I'll see you all in the new year fresh and ready to take on the yellow-Tory government.

Call for nominations to National Executive Council (NEC), Higher Education General Seat

Membership number: 5260154

Branch No. 20055

24th December 2010

Dear colleague,

RE: Nominate Max Watson - Chair of London Metropolitan University Branch, and NEC Higher Ed General Seat – for a fighting, democratic union!

Thank you to all those branches that nominated me in the recent by election – I am pleased to report that I successfully contested the election and have attended my first NEC meeting. I am writing (again) to seek nominations to the Higher Education General Seat of UNISON’s National Executive Council (NEC).

We are in the middle of an enormous struggle against cuts and the wholesale privatisation of Higher Education: our students have been showing the way in the fight against fees and the scrapping of EMA. Winning the by-election in November confirmed that our members want to see their union at the forefront of the resistance to these cuts. As Chair of London Met University Branch, members and activists are well aware of my history as an energetic campaigner – a fighting, militant union activist. Being elected was a vindication of our campaign’s central message: we need to step up a gear in the fight against the cuts and in defending education.

In our 2009 dispute my branch took action against cuts and won significant concessions: we stopped the outsourcing of IT and saved 200 jobs. Our branch continues to be dynamic and responsive to our members needs, engaging new activists and growing in membership: we have a full compliment of officers, our members are confident of our own strength and voice. We rejected the pay offer by 81% and our members have again shown a willingness to take further industrial action – at packed branch meetings recently, 100 members voted unanimously for taking action over compulsory redundancies.

I believe members of UNISON are willing to take action – whether over pensions, pay or against cuts – if the union is willing to show real leadership. Our time is now: this is a crucial year to coordinate action against the cuts. As well as build for the 26th March demo, we must also prepare for coordinated industrial action with our sister unions in the public sector.

I’m an independent, unaligned socialist; I’m not a member of any party. I am a supporter of UNISON United Left and believe in a democratic, lay member led union. I believe the establishment inside UNISON must end the sectarian witch-hunt against left activists so we can focus on building unity in the fight against the neo liberal Con-Dem government.

Unity with students’ movement
In November, I was also elected as a representative of education workers onto the steering committee of the Education Activist Network (EAN), which has been central to mobilising the recent protests against the cuts and increase in fees. I believe the key to winning in the fight against cuts is building strong alliances with the students’ movement and our communities as well as with our sister unions.

Locally, our branch showed genuine support for our students went they went into occupation, buying them food, donating money and collecting money in our workplaces; helping organise lectures; providing advice and moral support when needed. Our members have been cheering on the students and joining them on demonstrations and when we will take action next year, which we’re bound to need to, we can expect full support from the students in return. Our fight is their fight.

On 9th December, the day of the vote on fees, our members took to the streets to march to Parliament alongside the students’ just as we did with pride on the 10th November.

These cuts are a challenge, but I genuinely believe we should see this new era as an organising opportunity – a chance to make ourselves relevant to a whole new generation; to be attractive to young workers and students, to show them that we too have vast experience and they should naturally gravitate towards us. Our union could be increasing our membership and lowering our average age in the next period if we put ourselves at the centre of the resistance to the cuts – but only if we show courage and determination, be bolder, more radical, as the students have been.

Living Wage and outsourced workers
We’ve also begun a Living Wage campaign at London Met. I believe the union must throw its full weight behind organising outsourced workers in the public sector. Contracted out staff, sometimes called the ‘Hidden Workforce’, are the most vulnerable and have the most to gain from union membership. The best way to win back in-house is by organising the workers themselves. I’ve met cleaners who have won the Living Wage and are speaking confidently and with pride as UNISON activists, and am proud to say our campaign at London Met is showing real potential to win – just as they won at UCL, SOAS, Birkbeck, UEL and 10 other London Universities.

Unite Against Fascism
I recently chaired a meeting at London Met, to launch the beginning of a ‘Unite Against Fascism’ student society and our branch actively, successfully opposed the racist BNP in nearby Barking and Dagenham in the elections last year.

Solid activist track record
Since joining in 2006, on my first day at work, I’ve gone on to serve our branch as Young Members officer, a steward, Assistant Secretary, and for the last 18 months as Chair. I’m proud our branch had a strong record of resistance and our members are keenly engaged in what we do: whether it’s with our widely praised campaign against stress or fighting job cuts, or talking to one another in discussion forums online, our branch is healthy and dynamic and has well attended branch meetings and socials. I believe good communication is a fundamental part of our union organising: my branch has a lively ‘Facebook group’, a great website, with our own ‘Youtube channel’ and I write a weekly email to all members with news, events and activities to get involved with: http://www.londonmetunison.org.uk/

In between leading another local campaign against job cuts at London Met, getting involved with the EAN and local anti-cuts networks, I also managed to win the election to the NEC in November. Since then, I attended my first NEC in December, and my first committee meetings will be after I send out this letter. I cannot report back too much yet, but read reports and find out a bit more about me, by visiting my website: http://maxwatsonunison.blogspot.com/

You can also contact me via:

• Facebook: http://www.facebook.com/Max.Watson77
• Twitter: http://twitter.com/salaam_max
• Email: salaam_max@yahoo.co.uk
• Phone: 07793 145 754

Please also feel free to invite me to speak to you branch committee if you wish to meet me or hear for me in person. If you would prefer to write me a letter the good old fashioned way, please get in touch and I will send you my address.

Please note the nomination period opens on 11th January and closes on the 18th February 2011, so you can only nominate during that period. Please also nominate Carole Hanson, from Brighton University, who is standing for the Female Higher Education seat.

Nominate Max Watson to re-elect a dynamic, fighting candidate with a strong track record of activism. It’s time for a change in direction, with ‘new blood’ on the NEC. And contact me to find out how else you can get involved in our growing campaign for a fighting, democratic union.

In solidarity,

Max Watson

Thanks for taking the time to read this – I know how busy you all are. If you haven’t received a nomination form by 11th January, 2011, please call: 0845 355 0845 or visit: http://www.unison.org.uk/elections/

We will continue to mobilise, to occupy, to demonstrate...

Is Aaron Porter dead in the water?

Last night, we were being crushed in a kettle so badly, at one point many people – mostly young working class, black, white and Asian teenagers – were shouting to back off and leave us alone. And some began to think the worst: “it’s going to be another Hillsborough, here”. “They’re going to kill us in this crush.”

To our backs; a large brick wall, impassable. To our left; parked police vans with engines running, impassable. In front, riot police baton charging protesters – don’t even try going that way. Turn the other way and there are police mounted on horseback pushing into the young crowd yelling their catch phrase, without irony: "Get back."

"Where can we go?" The police can see, from their mounted horses, that we’re being badly crushed, and the only way out is into the swinging batons of rioting police. Why are they crushing us? They’re ‘just following orders’, as they say (but not in a German accent, you understand).

Whose orders? The political elite, who have given the go ahead to punish protesters who have no vote because they’re too young and yet dared to speak out. Those so-called ‘liberals’ who have said that they would not vote against fees because that would be a capitulation to the student demonstrations.

Instead they would rather we are beaten, crushed and charged at with frightened horses.

I’ve seen terrified young girls crying to be let free. Pregnant young women being charged by horses. I’ve seen bloody heads, and police smirking and even laughing at us as we beg to be let out. I’ve seen teenagers punched in the face by ‘thugs’ – as Sir Paul Stevenson called us this morning – wearing balaclavas but no badges and their numbers covered up.

Ian Tomlinson is the other name the protesters shout at the police as they call for justice. Remember him? I’d be unsurprised if we don’t soon hear the worst, as we nearly have already.

The attack on such a large body of youth has confirmed to us what many already know – that the police are not here for our safety at all. They’re here to protect their safety – the elite, the politicians, the monarchy and their property… They call the shots, and we get repeatedly horse-charged.

And it also has to be said – although I am firmly on the side of organised labour – that some of our trade union ‘leaders’ should be embarrassed about their pathetic ‘rally’ fifteen minutes away, on the Embankment, starring Peter Hain (!), Brendan Barber and Sally Hunt. They spoke to a shrinking crowd of embarrassed trade unionists. Our crew from London Met only lasted ten minutes it was so cringe-worthy. Not to mention the music - described as 'like being at an Uncle's wedding'.

In the words of one disgusted colleague as she left: “What’s this, the middle class protest?!” The speakers continued, meanwhile ignoring the fact their sons and daughters around the corner were being kettled again. What were they thinking? It was only a fifteen minute walk but felt like a million miles from the energy and enthusiasm of the protests - more like a carnival at that point (essential viewing - Paul Mason's 'Dubstep rebellion') - in Parliament square.

Why wasn’t Aaron Porter, the ‘leader’ of the NUS in amongst those students who were demonstrating and celebrating their own movement? Why did Sally Hunt and Aaron Porter turn their backs on those brave youth who entered Parliament Square knowing full well that the police would kettle them as punishment?

If the trade union movement wants to revive itself at this crucial time it should not be writing letters of support to the President of the NUS, it should be on the streets with the youth – who could be our next generation of union leaders. We must get out there and win them over to the ideas that made us strong in the first place: we must educate, agitate and organise those youth. As I’ve argued elsewhere, we are going to simply die out if we don’t make ourselves relevant to the next generation.

We must go to where the fight is, not rally where there are more speakers than listeners. Shame on those police who crush us and even tried to bruise us – but those trade union leaders who turned their back on us as we cried out for justice in Parliament square should also be embarrassed.

As we were held in place in the kettle and looking out for each other, I’ll never forget the sense of solidarity those young students showed to each other: holding each other up, urging each other not to panic as the crush go tighter; lifting those who were struggling up onto a wall where it was slightly safer and making room where there seemed to be none.

A few pockets of exemplary union banners from UNISON showed the way – Manchester Met, SOAS, Birkbeck and London Met were all present alongside dozen or so UCU banners of course, but we’re the ‘usual suspects’. Imagine if UNISON had brought their huge balloon into Parliament square, those youth will go on to instinctively support us when we go into dispute and out on strike as we’re surely going to next year. Where was UNITE and the GMB? These youth will need to join unions in their jobs and they could quickly become stewards and get organised in the workplace as they have done in their schools and colleges. They'd be much more likely to if our support was more tangible, more visible.

As a Naomi Bain, from Birkbeck UNISON, laughed: "While I was kettled (briefly) with a UNISON banner last night, two teenage girls walked past, one pointed at the banner and said "It's SO weird that that's your DAD's union!"."

Let's hope we didn't completely miss a trick and we can show maximum support to this movement. The youth are all saying, ‘this isn’t over’ and talking about their own 1968 - they're expecting us to get involved in the fight back. We have to, it's urgent.

A final word of warning: the rank and file students movement are again talking about a vote of no confidence in Porter as he's abandoned them time and again. Aaron Porter could soon be politically dead in the water. And this is what could happen to union leaders who also fail to deliver in the months and years ahead.
--
See also an account from a good friend Matthew Cassel, whose photo I nicked, and from 'United Against Police Violence'. Also read this account of a journalist being pulled from his wheelchair.

Smells like teen spirit

“Bliss was it in that dawn to be alive,
But to be young was very heaven!--Oh! times,
In which the meagre, stale, forbidding ways
Of custom, law, and statute, took at once
The attraction of a country in romance!”

(Wordsworth)


In under a month the political landscape has completely changed. Before 1oth November, trade unionists could look you in the eye and grumble 'we can't take action now, we still need to win the arguments first.'

Just try telling young people to be patient... Us activists in Education unions have been watching with total admiration as occupations spread around the country, and school, college and university students have walked out of classes to attend inspirational days of action, bringing cities to a standstill.

These actions were mainly called from the bottom up, since the 10th November demo, by activist groups and spontaneous movements, whilst the leadership of the NUS has been trying to play catch-up to the mood.

Students have organised their own weekly assemblies and all occupations are democratically run. Many journalists have noted the level of democracy at the occupied universities, and listened in awe of their debates, and hoping to see their action catch on. As Paul Holmes, fellow UNISON NEC member rightly says:

"All trade union branches should be inviting students to a branch meeting and trade union activists should visit University demonstrations and 'sit-ins'. We should show mutual support."

One of the things we're doing successfully at London Met is building on the unity between staff and students (see our 'Save London Met' banner with all three union logos and our continued support for their occupation). Rather than remembering 1979, the student occupations I've been to have been discussing 1968, and slogans like 'Students of the world, ignite!'

And whilst us trade unionists are constantly reminded of the anti-union laws to keep us from taking 'wildcat' action, tens of thousands of students have been walking out of classes, risking suspension from school or college.

Some students had to break open gates to join demonstrations in recent weeks. Others had to climb over gates and face down threats from head teachers. They've been 'kettled' and charged by police, beaten and then vilified by the media. And still they march in their thousands, defying authority in a way that is so natural to young people.

Today I attended my first Higher Education Service Group Exec meeting, and tomorrow is my first National Executive Council... I wonder if the inspiring students movement will stir our 'labour leaders' into action.

Whatever happens, I'll see you on 'Day X'.