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The Pay Up campaign
Message from the
TGWU/Unite Parliamentary Branch Chair, Dan Whittle - January
2008
We are in a great position starting the New Year in terms of membership, recruitment and campaigning. We can be proud of what we’re doing. We now have over 400 members and rising, and our lobbying of the SSRB paid off with an increase in the allowances MPs have available to pay us, which was agreed to last month.
I am very pleased to have taken over the Chair at a time when many of these things were about to come into fruition, because of the hard work of the former Chair and all of the Executive Committee. There are 3 campaigns I would like to update you on: The SSRB review, the queue jumping campaign and the campaign for recognition.
The SSRB review
I hope you managed to see one of our briefings on the SSRB report which I emailed to all MPs, and which set out the gains to staff, notably:
Recommendation 20 a Staffing Expenditure increase to allow MPs to employ up to 3.5 full-time (or equivalent) members of staff; Recommendation 21 that the ceiling should be £96,630; Recommendation 22: that the ceiling on be increased by £1,720 for each fulltime equivalent member of staff based in London, up to a maximum of £102,650.
The branch’s task now is to ensure that that expenditure increase is passed on to researchers and caseworkers. As it says in the briefing we sent round to MPs: 20% of MPs don’t pass on all of their staffing allowance to staff.
We are also continuing to push MPs on the automatic uprating of salaries. Their staffing allowance goes up every year but many of them do not pass this increase on. We are also going to push MPs on the starting salaries of researchers and secretaries which at around £13,000 are far too low.
MP of the year so far goes to Linda Gilroy MP, who in the debate on the SSRB argued that if MPs get their pay automatically uprated, so should staff. We get another chance to lobby MPs on this when some of the recommendations go to the Members Estimates Committee.
The
union campaigns for better working conditions and pay for staff. The 5th
July 2001 decision by Parliament to provide decent pay, more staff for
MPs, provide better employment procedures, security in constituency
offices and 'ring-fence' the money allocated for staff wages (so you
don't have to compete with a new fax machine when asking for your annual
wage rise) was the culmination of 20 years' campaigning by the TGWU
branch. Obviously,
the more staff who join the union, the stronger our voice is.
The union branch has made representations to the Speaker's Advisory Panel on the implementation of these proposals and is arguing for the best possible contracts to be adopted. In the current climate, Health and Safety is obviously of major concern and we have pushed for improvements to staff safety, especially with relation to security and post.
Click here for a pdf version (22KB) of: TGWU PARLIAMENTARY STAFF BRANCH 1/427
SUBMISSION TO THE SENIOR SALARIES REVIEW BODY: REVIEW OF PARLIAMENTARY PAY AND ALLOWANCES. This was submitted in January 2004.Commons Cleaners Strike - “Makes me proud to be in the T&G”
That was the verdict of one of the branch’s newer members as they saw how much support the union gave to the House of Commons’ cleaners on their strike day in July.
Branch officers and members joined picket lines and were invited to the mass meeting at Parliament and we helped with organisational back-up and ensuring MPs’ support – not that most MPs needed much encouraging!
The Commons cleaners are in dispute over their pay and conditions, in particular the absolute minimum legal holidays their receive (12 days on top of 8 Bank Holidays), lack of company pension and a wage of a fiver an hour.
The cleaners’ reps and their Organiser, Rhys McCarthy, have met regularly with the branch and its officers and we will continue to support them. In the meantime, please urge your MP to sign EDM 434 (tabled by Shahid Malik who also joined the cleaners’ picket line), if they have not already done so.
Over the summer, T&G members were once again force to show their solidarity as the baggage handlers at Heathrow walked out in support of 670 Gate Gourmet staff who had been summarily sacked, apparently for staying too long at a staff meeting while waiting for union advice. Gate Gourmet has a history of poor treatment of staff and amongst those sacked were workers on holiday or on sick leave.
Without the action of the baggage handlers- and subsequent pressure from BA - there is little doubt that Gate Gourmet management would have refused to go to the negotiating table with the T&G.
The T&G is fast gaining itself a reputation as the champion of the low paid, which will stand up for its members when they need it.
By Kevin Flack
Branch Secretary
Last updated: 11 February 2008