UNISON calls on MSPs to oppose fees increase for health and care professionals

Date: Monday 15 June 2015

UNISON is calling on MSPs to oppose new legislation which aims to substantially increase registration fees for professions registered with the Health and Care Professions Council.  

The Scottish Parliament's Health and Sport Committee will consider this subordinate legislation (regulations) at its meeting on Tuesday, 16 June. UNISON is requesting an opportunity to give evidence to the committee to say why they oppose increased fees.

Dave Watson, UNISON Scotland head of bargaining and campaigns said:

"Staff have no choice but to pay this fee to work and at best have had a meagre 1% pay rise in accordance with the Scottish Government pay policy.

"On the other hand the Health and Care Professions Council is proposing a 12.5% rise to their professional fees. 

Working harder but getting poorer is conclusion of new report comparing wages and prices

Mon 13 October 2014

A new report from public services union UNISON - 'The Price of Everything and the Value of Wages' - paints a stark picture of the decline and fall in living standards for workers across public services.

Years of zero or below inflation pay rises have meant that the value of wages has failed to keep pace with rising prices. 'The Cost of Everything and the Value of Wages' tracks how prices have risen faster than wages and the way that inflation as it is experienced by the poorly paid is often significantly higher than headline figures would suggest.

The report details how the cost of food, fuel, childcare and rent amongst other essentials has increased faster than wages.

Dave Watson, Head of Bargaining and Campaigns with UNISON Scotland said:

“It’s no coincidence that we are bringing this report out at the start of Challenge Poverty week and the day of the Poverty Alliance Conference. Wage freezes are reducing people to poverty one fifth of the children in poverty in Scotland are in households where at least one adult is working.

"It’s no use politicians in Edinburgh and London trumpeting record employment figures if those in work aren’t getting enough to live on.

"Scotland needs a pay rise that’s the message we’ll be sending out loudly all this week and most especially on Saturday’s STUC demonstration for Decent Work and Dignified Lives.”

ENDS

Notes to editors:

The full UNISON Scotland report 'The Price of Everything and the Value of Wages' can be found herehttp://www.unison-scotland.org.uk/publicworks/
ThePriceof_UNISONScotlandReport_Oct2014.pdf

STUC Demonstration 18 October For A Just Scotland: Decent Work and Dignified Lives - Saturday 18 October 2014 in Glasgow. STUC links for more information
http://www.stuc.org.uk/
http://www.ajustscotland.org/events/4/18-october-march-and-rally

2% inflation means bad news for public service workers - UNISON

Tuesday 14 January 2014

New figures showing inflation at 2.% in December brings no relief for public sector workers hit by the Government's pay freeze and squeeze, said UNISON, the UK's largest union. A fall in inflation is only positive news if earnings are keeping pace with overall inflation warned the union.

UNISON General Secretary Dave Prentis said:

"Inflation might be 2% but across the country, the reality is families are still struggling to make ends meet. There is no feeling that day to day life is improving for the vast majority.  It is only the financial elite in  the City who are looking forward to bumper bonuses this year.  The rise in the Retail Price Index to 2.7% shows the underlying cost of living crisis is getting worse.

"With transport, energy bills and  childcare cost going up, households have seen family finances significantly reduced with average earnings rising by less than the rate of inflation for the fifth year running.

“For public service workers hit hard by the Government's freeze and squeeze on their pay, 2% inflation means more hardship. Workers continue to see a squeeze in their pay and the cost of living crisis will carry on as long as their pay does not increase. It's high time the Government did something to help the millions of working families living in poverty and stopped pretending things are getting better."

UNISON UK News release: http://www.unison.org.uk/news/2-inflation-means-bad-news-for-public-sector-workers

Inflation up – Scotland’s local government workers deserve fair pay

#YestoFairPay

 

UNISON Scotland said today that inflation rising to 2.9% is grim news for hard pressed workers struggling to make ends meet.

The public services union is currently balloting members in local government on strike action to win an improvement on COSLA’s pay offer of just 1%.

Scottish Secretary Mike Kirby said:

“Sustained high inflation, coupled with a prolonged pay freeze, then squeeze for millions of public sector workers across the UK, has hit families hard.

“Parents are cutting back on food, clothes, even on things for their children – they are being priced out of basic living. Meanwhile, it is still boom time for British bankers who are dominating the EU bankers’ rich list.

Union announces Scotland wide strike ballot of council staff - #YestoFairPay

4 June 2013

Local government workers across Scotland are being balloted on strike action, after rejecting a 1% pay offer.

UNISON, the public services union, will ballot 75,000 members working for Scotland’s 32 local authorities.

Stephanie Herd, Chair of UNISON’s Local Government Committee, said: “Members are angry about a miserly 1% offer, following two years of a pay freeze.

“The year before that they only received 0.65%. Over this period the value of their pay has gone down by nearly 13%, while the cost of food and heating has soared.

“Council staff work hard delivering quality public services. They are overstretched after more than 34,500 local government jobs have gone. They are underpaid, and they see the wealthiest people in this country getting ever richer.

“Our members deserve fair pay and we believe they will vote yes for strike action to put pressure on the employers to improve the offer.”

UNISON is calling for a fair pay rise and for COSLA to commit to an annual increase in the Scottish Local Government Living Wage of £7.50 per hour. The current offer from employers includes the Living Wage, which the unions have campaigned for, but no annual uplift.

Dougie Black, UNISON lead negotiator in local government, said: “We tried to get the employers back round the table for talks after members voted to reject the offer, but the employers refused.

“It is clear that our members do not believe 1% is fair. They also lost out because they did not receive the £250 increase for the lowest paid NHS and civil service staff in the last two years, which was supposed to soften the blow of a pay freeze.”


ENDS




Notes to editors:
1. UNISON is Scotland’s largest trade union representing 160,000 members working in the public sector in Scotland, including staff at all 32 local authorities.

2. The union’s local government membership includes cooks, cleaners, classroom assistants, housing staff, library workers, cleansing and environmental protection staff, technicians and trading standards workers and early years workers and social work staff .

3. Members whose conditions are linked to local government pay and conditions are also being balloted.

4. The ballot will run from 3 July to 13 August, with a proposal, if members vote yes, of a minimum of three days of strike action over a seven week period in the autumn. Two of these would be national one day strikes and there would be a rolling programme of one day strikes around the country. Selective action is also being considered.

5. In the run up to the ballot opening, UNISON branches will hold two Fair Pay Days of Action in council workplaces around the country. These will be on June 11 and 25.

6. The June 25 Fair Pay Day will also form part of the STUC’s Austerity Uncovered -There is A Better Way nine days of action across Scotland, focusing on the effects of cuts to services and benefits.

7. Unite is also balloting members in local government.

More information on our Fair Pay for Local Government 2013 campaign page: www.unison-scotland.org.uk/localgovt/pay2013 

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Pay freezes are driving down living standards, while the rich get richer

15 May 2013

 

Public services union UNISON today released a report showing how pay freezes are contributing to sharply declining living standards for workers in vital services.

UNISON contrasted the increasing wealth of the richest with the “triple whammy” of frozen pay, inflation and tax and benefit changes affecting ordinary families.

Dave Watson, Head of Bargaining and Campaigns, said the impact is “bad for families, bad for services and bad for the economy.”

He added: “Any serious economic recovery will involve boosting demand, partly by providing fair pay settlements for workers in public services.”

Stephanie Herd, chair of the union’s Local Government Committee, said: “Council workers across Scotland have in effect had their pay cut through the pay freeze. This report confirms just how much of a hit they are taking. It shows why the current local government pay offer is not enough and has been rejected by our members.

“We need an end to the pay freeze and fair pay for workers, who we know will spend their money locally, boosting the economy in the process.”

She added that only the implementation of Living Wage policies across much of the public sector in Scotland has offered any respite to workers hit by the assault on their living standards.

On pay, median gross weekly pay in Scotland in 2007 was £360.20. This had risen to £396.10 by 2012. If it had increased in line with inflation, it would be £423.22 by 2012. A worker earning median pay (exactly halfway along the income distribution – half earning more, half earning less), is therefore 6.4% or £27.12 a week and £1410.24 a year worse off.

Inflation as it is experienced by lower paid workers is higher than indexed levels and hurts more. Inescapable essential expenditure items like food, fuel and transport have all risen far higher than the CPI in recent years.

Meanwhile the combined impact of tax and benefit changes will mean a 1% drop in income for the bottom 30% of households and 2% for households with one earner and two children.

In sharp contrast the wealthiest, as measured by the Sunday Times Rich List, recorded rises in wealth of 18%, 4.7% and 8.7%, very comfortably above inflation for each of the last three years. Their collective wealth is nearly £450 billion, more than three times the UK deficit.

Dave Watson UNISON Head of Bargaining and Campaigns said: “These figures confirm what our members know from their pockets and purses - wages aren’t going as far they used to.

“While our members struggle to provide services with ever fewer resources and then to pay their bills when they get home, those at the very top are getting richer and richer.”

 

Notes to editors:

1. UNISON is Scotland’s largest trade union representing 160,000 members working in the public sector in Scotland.

2. Full figures are in the new ‘ Briefing on Wages, Inflation and Inequality’, online at  www.unison-scotland.org.uk/briefings/b034_BargainingBrief_WagesInflation+Inequality_May2013.pdf

 

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INFLATION FIGURES HIGHLIGHT HEATING OR EATING DILEMMA

19 March 2013

Commenting on inflation figures out today Dave Prentis, General Secretary of UNISON, the UK’s largest union, said:

“The unprecedented, unrelenting squeeze on family budgets is yet another example of the Tory-led coalition’s ongoing failure to turn recession into recovery.

“A public sector pay freeze turned squeeze has hit families and high streets hard. The spiraling cost of energy means people face the misery of choosing between heating and eating.

"And as families suffer, its boom time for millionaires in Tory Britain who are in line for tax cuts in tomorrow’s budget.

“The government has to take radical action to turn our economy around. Tinkering at the edges will not work. The Chancellor could take an important step in the right direction by ending the pay squeeze and stopping the jobs carnage in the public sector.

ENDS


Notes to editors:

A recent survey by UNISON's Welfare Fund, There for you, found that more than half of applicants for a fuel grant (56.6%) had sacrificed food to keep warm, while 69% had cut back on clothing and 80% on leisure. The survey also revealed that 77.7% avoid putting the heating on, while 54.6% only heated the room they were in.

In the last year there was a massive 388% increase in demand for applications to the union‚s fund for fuel grant assistance.

The union's full plan to help the government turn recession into recovery is available on the UNISON UK website here:
www.unison.org.uk/asppresspack/pressrelease_view.asp?id=3002


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More pain to come for families - UNISON on RPI

Tue 15 Jan 2013
 UNISON said that families were facing winter fuel misery as the government announced an increase in the Retail Prices Index.

For families struggling to heat their homes in the face of massive price hikes and freezing weather, there was more pain to come, the union warned.

UNISON general secretary Dave Prentis said:“It’s time for the government to get a grip; the reality is that families are struggling to heat their homes and put food on the table.

“There is yet more misery to come, as the freezing weather starts to bite, fuel bills continue to rise, and wages remain stagnant.

“It’s time for the government to act; unscrupulous pay-day loan companies are filling the gap that has been created by high unemployment, the public sector pay freeze, and soaring fuel costs.

“Inflation still remains well above the government’s 2% target, placing enormous pressure on the finances of low and middle income households. Austerity isn’t working, and a plan of real growth is needed to help families bridge the gap between their incomes and the soaring cost of living.”

ENDS

UNISON UK News Release:
http://www.unison.org.uk/news/news_view.asp?did=8295


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Inflation rate - UNISON reaction

Tuesday 18 Dec 2012

The latest figures showing that inflation has remained static at 2.7% “is the lull before the storm” warned UNISON Chief Dave Prentis today.

He went on to say:
“Big increases in energy prices are set to hit in the New Year and the cost of feeding a family just keeps on going up.

“More than a million public sector workers have not had a pay rise for three years and the value of their take home pay just keeps on going down. It is a disgrace that this Government is instrumental in plunging so many families into poverty and turning to food banks for relief over Christmas.”

Ends


http://www.unison.org.uk/asppresspack/pressrelease_view.asp?id=2914


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UNISON slams inflation change proposals

29 Nov 2012

UNISON has slammed proposals that have been put forward to change the way that official inflation measures are calculated, describing them as a back-door attack on pay settlements for workers who are already hard-pressed.

The Office of National Statistics has been consulting on revisions to the statistical techniques used to develop the Retail Price Index (RPI), which could result in the widely-used inflation measure being cut by almost a third.

UNISON has lodged a response to the consultation that exposes the proposals as statistical sleight of hand that would consistently under-estimate the change in the cost of living that workers actually face in their day-to-day lives.

UNISON assistant general secretary Karen Jennings commented: "RPI has been widely accepted as the most accurate indicator of the changes workers face in their cost of living for the past 65 years.

"The sudden 'discovery' of these claimed flaws in the calculation of RPI comes at a remarkably convenient time for the government's austerity programme.

"Slashing the value of RPI would be another downward pressure on pay, at a time when employees and their families are already reeling from years of inflation decimating the value of their pay packets, and savage cuts in public services and welfare support, on top of job losses that have left six people competing for every vacancy."

UNISON UK news release is here

To read UNISON's full response to the consultation click here.

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Energy profits cold comfort for customers - UNISON

Wed 14 Nov

 The £400 million half-year profits announced by energy company SSE have been branded obscene as thousands of families struggle in the face of a 9% bill increase.

The UK’s largest union has accused energy companies of exploiting the basic human need for warmth to line the pockets of shareholders, and called ‘price cap promises’ an empty gesture that sounds the alarm bell to further increases next winter.

Mike Jeram, UNISON head of business and environment, said:

“It is chilling that companies such as SEE should announce these enormous half-year profits when families are being forced to take the hit for yet-another massive price hike.

“All eyes are on the energy companies, and the suggestion of price fixing will put a long-overdue spotlight on the practices of companies who line the pockets of shareholders while their customers freeze.

“SSE’s ‘commitment’ to cap energy prices until the second half of next year just means that, come Winter 2013, customers can expect more of the same shabby treatment, and yet another massive price hike.

“Where is the evidence of the government’s commitment to keeping energy prices down? As ever, it’s just more hot air being wasted in the corridors of power, when it would be better served keeping families, the vulnerable and the elderly warm.”

ENDS

UNISON UK news release:http://www.unison.org.uk/asppresspack/pressrelease_view.asp?id=2879

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