Anti-union laws

The PCS NEC has agreed to hold a re-ballot of civil service members this March. The ballot will run from the 18th of March to the 29th of April and will hopefully reach the 50% turnout required by the anti-union laws, falling 8% short of that threshold last year.

The amount of members balloted this year as part of this national ballot is slightly less at 120,000 to allow bargaining units that are not ‘core civil service’ - and therefore not subject to the same pay regime - to choose to opt-in to the pay campaign.

The civil service union PCS has just completed a membership consultation on the 2019 civil service pay claim and campaign plan.

The Eastern region of the Fire Brigades Union (FBU) has voted to back the Free Our Unions statement – the second FBU region to do so, after the West Midlands – and purchase 200 copies of the Free Our Unions pamphlet produced by the Labour left group The Clarion. The two regions have also arranged to raise the campaign at FBU national conference in May.

Care workers employed by charity Alternative Futures Group are balloting for strikes to resist a pay cut announced by their employer in November.

The workers, who are members of Unison, face a cut of up to £40 following AFG bosses’ announcement that they will no longer pay an additional allowance for workers who sleep overnight at service users’ homes as part of their shift.

In 2018 the Fire Brigades Union, which organises operational firefighters, fire control staff, fire brigade officers and others in the UK fire and rescue service, celebrated its hundredth anniversary as an independent union. For its centenary the FBU has published a book, Fighting Fire, about the last thirty years of its history.

Now that the Public and Commercial Services union is on course for another national ballot in March 2019, a key question is what we need to do to beat the 50% turnout threshold this time. One option might be a disaggregated ballot.

Workers from McDonalds, Wetherspoons and TGI Fridays all took part in an international co-ordinated day of action for £10 per hour and union rights on Thursday 4 October.

In London they were joined by Deliveroo and Uber Eats riders, and supporters from across the labour movement. At their rally and demonstration in Leicester Square they were joined by traffic wardens in Camden Unison, who are also currently on strike for a £11.15 an hour.

Solidarity action took place in cities across the UK. The first Wetherspoons strike was also coordinated from two sites in Brighton.

France: Macron tries to speed up reforms, but meets strong opposition

Macron – who owes his election to the elimination of any left or labour movement candidate in the 1st round of the Presidential election, against a backdrop of massive abstentionism – was able to force through his law against the Labour Code in Autumn 2017. That completed the El Khomri law, which inspired a strong mobilisation lasting more than four months under the Hollande Presidency in spring 2016.

On Tuesday 6 March teachers in West Virginia, USA, were celebrating winning all five of their demands after a nine-day statewide strike and included an occupation of the Capitol.

Teachers defeated an expansion of charter schools (similar to academy schools in the UK), a proposal to eliminate seniority, and a ″paycheck-protection″ bill which would have ended union dues being collected from pay. They won a significant pay rise and a mechanism to change unfair health-insurance practices.

The Communication Workers’ Union (CWU) in the Royal Mail ballot has set the gold standard for all other major unions in the UK. It was the first nationwide strike ballot since the Trade Union Act 2016, which came fully into force in March 2017, and dictates that lawful strike action now requires a 50% turnout to vote.