Still irresistible, a working-class hero's finest speech Many may not have rationalised it. May not even understand, may not be able to articulate it. But they feel it. Society and its prevailing sense of values leads to another form of alienation. It is easy and tempting to hate such people. Let me give two examples from contemporary experience to illustrate the point. Recently on television I saw an advert. The other illustration is the widespread, implicit acceptance of the concept and term "the rat race". To the students [of Glasgow University] I address this appeal. Profit is the sole criterion used by the establishment to evaluate economic activity. Government by the people for the people becomes meaningless unless it includes major economic decision-making by the people for the people. The concentration of power in the economic field is matched by the centralisation of decision-making in the political institutions of society. Local government is to be restructured. Even this is not enough.
The Only Way is Down Some notes on the election result from Dougald Hine. So, good morning. I’m afraid it’s true: that nightmare you had, it wasn’t a dream. Labour is about to endure a tug of war between those who believe it needs to go leftwards and those who believe it needs to go rightwards. What we have seen is a failure of politics, a failure of democracy at a cultural level, part of a larger story playing out across the struggling countries of the post-industrial west. The one cold comfort that Labour – and perhaps even the Lib Dems – could take from last night’s results is that events have forced them into a confrontation with reality, while the Tories will continue to govern on the basis of delusions, with ugly results, for a while longer, before gravity catches up with them. What follows are a set of notes that might help us get our bearings for this journey, some of which may turn out to be wildly off the mark. Everything is broken 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. A 200-year moment? 7. 8. 9. 10. 11. 12. 13. 14.
Zero hours: Time to put a stop to this exploitation - ToUChstone blog 01 Apr 2015, by Sarah Veale in Working Life Very few people in the UK today would not know about zero hours contracts. The Prime Minister himself said that he wouldn’t want to work on one. Most regard them as a bad thing – exploitative and unwanted. People on zero hours contracts have precarious lifestyles because they cannot predict with any certainty now much money they will be earning from day to day. Being on a zero hours contract is not compatible with our social security system. Use of zero hours work is now prevalent in the social care sector. It is particularly disgraceful that large businesses, who often pay their senior executives in terms of millions rather than thousands, use these shameful employment arrangements, often using the excuse of flexibility. The TUC supports measures that will curb the exploitation of workers by regulating the use of zero hours contracts, so that everybody has a guarantee of a minimum amount of paid work every week.
The curious case of yesterday's living standards 'good news' - ToUChstone blog 01 Apr 2015, by Geoff Tily in Economics Right from the off yesterday, ONS statistics triggered a celebration of rising living standards. Yet you were hard pushed to find exactly the reason for that celebration. In the newly-issued National Accounts, real household disposable income per head in 2014 fell by -0.1 per cent compared with 2013, and was still down -2.4 per cent on the peak in 2010.This measure was previously described by the Chancellor in his Budget speech as “The most up-to-date and comprehensive measure of living standards which is real household disposable income [RHDI] per capita”. The answer was instead found in the quarterly ‘Economic Well-Being’ release, which included a brand new measure: RHDI excluding NPISH (non-profit institutions serving households, which covers charities, religious organisations and labour organisations, like the TUC). The BBC went for it, opening the six o’clock news: To the backdrop of the Chancellor helping out in a Pizza Restaurant kitchen:
Trades Union Congress - Workers Memorial Day 2015 Every year more people are killed at work than in wars. Most don't die of mystery ailments, or in tragic "accidents". They die because an employer decided their safety just wasn't that important a priority. Workers' Memorial Day is held on 28 April every year, all over the world workers and their representatives conduct events, demonstrations, vigils and a whole host of other activities to mark the day. The day is also intended to serve as a rallying cry to “remember the dead, but fight for the living”. Over 20,000 people die every year because of their work. The Wales TUC will be marking WMD at 1 Cathedral Rd, Cardiff on the 28th of April.
How do you solve a problem like measurement of zero-hours contracts? - ToUChstone blog 23 Mar 2015, by Emily Pfefer in Labour market We know a fair deal about the detrimental growth of zero-hours contracts in the UK labour market. We know that workers on them cannot depend on how much money they will bring home or what childcare they will need from week to week. We know that typical workers on them are poorly paid. TUC analysis has shown that more than half of zero-hours contract workers earn less than the living wage. The same analysis demonstrated that zero-hours contract workers lose out on employment protections. We also know that zero-hours contracts are on the rise and they have risen every full year under the current government. The below graph illustrates the absolute and percent annual change on the fourth quarter, as published by the ONS last month. However, it is clear that something unusual happened between Q4 2012 and Q4 2013. However, if you do subtract all the growth from Q4 2012 to Q4 2013, the change under the current government is still pretty striking.
WhileWeWorkYouPlay_LeisureStaffSurvey_June2015.pdf Trades Union Congress - Amendment to health and safety rules will give green light for cowboys, says TUC 4 March 2015 The TUC has warned members of the House of Lords that plans they are voting on today (Wednesday) to scrap health and safety rules for millions of self-employed people will put both workers and the public at risk. The Deregulation Bill will amend section 3 of the Health and Safety at Work Act, which currently places a duty on all employers and self-employed people to take reasonable steps to ensure the health and safety of others. Any self-employed person who is not on a prescribed list will no longer have duties under the Act and will not be a liable for a criminal act, or be issued with enforcement proceedings regardless of any risk that they pose to themselves or others. The TUC says that the clause will remove 4.2 million self-employed people from the requirement of the Act and warns that the bill will be a recipe for confusion. TUC General Secretary Frances O’Grady said: “This is virtually a licence to kill. - All TUC press releases can be found at www.tuc.org.uk
Trades Union Congress - Outsourcing Public Services This report presents findings from research undertaken by the New Economics Foundation (NEF) which was commissioned by the Trades Union Congress (TUC). Based on the research, the TUC has identified a set of policy recommendations to address specific issues related to the outsourcing of public services, applicable to both national policy makers but also commissioning and procurement practitioners across the public sector. Our overall conclusion from this work is that the outsourcing of public services provision to private providers has a detrimental impact on the workforce and a knock-on effect on the quality of care. The research, conducted by the New Economics Foundation on behalf of the TUC, looked at the scale and scope of outsourcing in five key sectors – social care, health care, offender management, local government and employment services. Based on the research, the TUC has identified a set of policy recommendations to address issues related to the outsourcing of public services.