Just got back from a visit by Pat McFadden, Minister for Employment Relations, to the TUC’s vulnerable workers pilot project in east London. The project is supporting workers in the cleaning and building service sector in the City of London and Canary Wharf, and a key element of the visit was an opportunity for the Minister to hear first hand about the issues faced by workers in the sector, and union efforts  to support them.

The visit followed hot on the heels of the announcement that the TUC, CBIand government have agreed a way forward on agency working, which will mean tens of thousands of agency workers receive rights to ‘equal treatment’ once they have been working on a contract for 12 weeks or more. This should help stop unscrupulous employers using agency workers to undermine directly employed staff – and support union efforts to make sure agency workers have a voice at work. Movement on this issue is long overdue – and teh TUC has heralded it, quite rightly, as a ‘victory for union campaigning’. You can read the TUC’s full response here.

 

 

 

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Posted on May 20th, 2008 by Paul Nowak filed under: Union news

Are you going along to one of this year’s TUC Organising Academy Development Centres?

 

Are you wondering what exactly will happen during the Development Centre? 

Do you have any questions that you’d welcome the opportunity to have answered before you arrive?

If you’ve answered YES to any of the above then the TUC’s Organising & Recruitment Team together with Second Life may be able to help you out. 

If you log on to Second Life and teleport yourself to UNION ISLAND at 7.30 pm on either Tuesday May 27^th or Tuesday June 10^th you can find out more about the Development Centres in a meeting in the Union Island bar hosted by a member of the TUC Organising and Recruitment Team.

If you’re not already registered with Second Life, you can register at the link below which can also be used by existing Second Life users to teleport straight to Union Island.

www.slunionisland.org

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Posted on May 19th, 2008 by Carl Roper filed under: Union news, Union organising

Good article here from the Guardian setting out how unions are using the web to support their broader organising and campaigning work. The article quotes John Wood, the TUC’s new media officer, who is doing a lot to help unions and the technically-challenged like me to try and work out how best we can use web 2.0 (I don’t know what it means either) most effectively.

On a similar note last night the London Organisers Network ran an event looking at how unions can best use social networking sites like Facebook. I couldn’t get along, but I know the event was generating a lot of interest, and the fact that this sort of a stuff is becoming much more mainstream indicates that unions are beginning to think more seriously about some of the opportunities (and pitfalls) these new tools present.

All this talk of brave new cyber dawns for unions reminded me of an article the Guardian ran 8 years ago about an ‘organising database’ we developed while I was working for the North West TUC. In order to get the project up and running me and Danny, the tech guy who was working on the project, had to physically hump his old Apple Mac down to London and get it plugged in to the TUC’s computer system – cutting edge stuff! This was at a time when the TUC web-site used to go down regularly at the weekend, and couldn’t be revived until Monday when the office re-opened…

 

 

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Posted on May 15th, 2008 by Paul Nowak filed under: Unions online

In the next few weeks the TUC’s Organising Academy will start its recruitment process for new Academy organisers.

We are looking for committed and enthusiastic people who want to help union efforts to go out and organise the next generation of union members and activists. Applicants should ideally have a proven track record of organising for the trade union movement or bring experience from organising for community and voluntary organisations, student unions, anti-racist campaigns or similar campaigning groups. Above all, you need to be quick to learn, and passionate about building stronger unions!

If you are interested in joining the Organising Academy, or just want to find out more or develop your organising skills, then join us at one of the 2008 Organising Academy Development Centres which will take will take place over each weekend in June in Manchester, London, Newcastle, Cardiff, Glasgow and Exeter.

Click here to download an application pack.

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Posted on May 9th, 2008 by Paul Nowak filed under: Union organising

Ten years ago I was one of the first trainee organisers to join the TUC Organising Academy, working with BIFU the finance union. The union has gone (first to become part of UNIFI, then AMICUS and now UNITE) but the Organising Academy is still going strong

On October 14 the TUC is hosting an event to mark 10 years of the Organising Academy – but also to look ahead to what more unions can do to grow.

We hope the event will be a good opportunity for as many of the 250 or so organisers who have gone through the Academy to get back together and celebrate the campaigns they have been part of. But we also want as many union activists, officers and organisers as possible to join us to think through some of the big challenges facing unions – how we build our activist base; how we begin to turn round private sector density decline; and how we position unions as strong, effective organisations in the workplace and beyond.

So please join us, and be a part of the debate on October 14!

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Posted on May 2nd, 2008 by Paul Nowak filed under: Union organising

Interesting link here to an article about agency working based around the 6-week diary of a Unite member who went ‘undercover’ to find out the reality of working for an employment agency.

‘His time as an agency worker revealed a shadowy and insecure world of work where no national insurance was paid, contracts of work did not exist and no workplace training or basic safety equipment was provided. Promises of permanent employment from agency positions also failed to materialise, contradicting the government’s arguments that agency working provides a gateway into direct employment.’

Bear in mind this guy is a white, English speaking, former union activist that knows his employment and health and safety rights. No doubt the problems he faced would be multiplied if he had been a migrant worker with poor English language skills, or a worker with little or no knowledge of his or her rights at work

His short diary shows just why its so important for agency workers to have the right to equal treatment at work – and for unions to continue to step up their efforts to organise agency workers.

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Posted on May 1st, 2008 by Paul Nowak filed under: Rights at work

Tonight the organising team will be hosting a discussion in SecondLife on reps and facilities time.

If you’d like to join us click here for more information.

The event is just one element of a range of activity taking place on Union Island to mark May Day. Hope you can join us!

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Posted on May 1st, 2008 by Paul Nowak filed under: Unions online