Author: admin

This is an excellent piece of work which I hope all UNISON branches will use to counter the propaganda that we must attack public services and those in need of public services

to view click here

Ex Barnet senior Manager Roger Jones now working for Ealing Council is in the process of bringing Highways Services back in-house. Multi national company Mouchel are currently providing the service but the contract comes to an end early next year.

 

The news that this service is returning in-house and can deliver savings of almost £1 million a year is clearly at odds with the anti in-house message staff are witnessing here in the Council.

 

Click here to read the Service Improvement Plan which went to Committee earlier this year.

Barnet UNISON members

 

Super Council?

You would have woken up to news of a proposed merger of London Councils into a Super Council promising savings of £100 million a year!….I listened to the Leader of Hammersmith Council and did not hear the Private Sector mentioned once!

 

I will report on this proposal after obtaining details from the three UNISON branches involved, after all it is important to drill down and study the details of any Press headlines.

 

SouthWestOne – Somerset

Two weeks ago I sent round details of another Strategic partnership failure in Liverpool. As Strategic Partnerships are the basis on which easyCouncil will be delivered please read on:

 

I am forwarding an article which appeared in the Local Government Chronicle today. Many of you will have seen the Southwest One ITV West documentary made 18 months ago detailing the IBM takeover of services in Somerset. The project was beset with controversy.

 

Somerset UNISON fought a campaign to expose the secrecy surrounding this Project and surprise surprise the branch secretary was suspended for almost six months. I am pleased to report he is back in the UNISON office.

 

For those of you who saw the ITV West documentary will know the project was shrouded in secrecy and very few people actually saw the Business Case for the Project. I have a copy of the documentary if anyone would like to view it.

 

Bridgewater MP Ian Liddell-Grainger (Con) has been campaigning against Southwest One for over two years and fought hard to try to gain access to the Business Case.

 

I imagine Somerset County Lib-Dem councillors wish they had demanded to see the Business Case as the Lib-Dem’s were later ousted by the Conservatives in the last elections.

 

Interestingly a contingent from SouthwestOne paid a visit to Barnet during the summer. I don’t know what they discussed but after viewing this latest news I really, really hope they haven’t been advising Barnet Council on the benefits of partnerships with the Private Sector

 

Professor Dexter Whitfield was the consultant providing expert advice for Somerset UNISON Branch. Dexter said at the time “The Somerset strategic partnership with IBM was a classic example of ideologically driven outsourcing. Somerset UNISON warned about the declining level of savings and higher contract management costs. The increasing annual losses of the joint venture company serve to illustrate the high risks involved in these contracts.”

Dexter has and continues to provide expert advice for the branch.

Take a look at this report From Local Government Chronicle

Somerset joint venture loses £16m in its first year

21 October 2010 | By Ruth Keeling

A controversial joint venture between Somerset’s councils, police force and IBM has made a multi-million pound loss for the second year running.

Southwest One posted an operating loss of £16.1m in its second year of operation, according to accounts lodged with Companies House earlier this month.

The 2008-09 accounts state that the loss – a significant increase on the £2m it lost in its first year – “was larger than originally budgeted” because its investment period had to be extended and because it failed to attract new customers. A credit facility from parent company IBM means it will continue to operate for the “foreseeable future”, according to the accounts.

The joint venture was set up in September 2007 by IBM, who own three-quarters of the company, and Somerset CC and Taunton Deane BC to provide back office services including HR, finance, estates management and IT. Avon and Somerset Police later joined the partnership but it has been dogged by arguments from the first.

Most recently, it emerged that the two councils would be fined because of the extra checks that the Audit Commission had to make on their accounts prepared by the firm. Taunton Deane said it would pay its £15,000 charge itself while Somerset CC, whose leader is currently considering an internal review of the Southwest One contract, said it would pass the charge on to the company.

The contract, worth £585m over 10 years to the company, was set up with the aim of finding efficiencies for the three customers, although those savings have been downgraded from the £200m originally quoted to £144m “pipeline” savings listed in the most recent accounts.

In a statement, Southwest One emphasised that the 2008-09 figures were “a reflection that first of a kind ventures like this require up-front investment in the early stages” and stated that there had been no negative impact on the service. In fact, it added, a new customer contact centre had call waiting times for residents.

Southwest One’s accounts blamed its failure to attract new partners on the “adverse UK economic environment, coupled with a high degree of political uncertainty”.

However, the company said it was in discussion with a number of potential customers and argued that the spending review and the communities secretary’s enthusiasm for shared services would provide “significant opportunities”.

It stated: “South West One, as a pioneer in this field, is ideally-placed to help public bodies respond to this challenge”.

But Bridgewater MP Ian Liddell-Grainger (Con) branded the partnership a “failure” and questioned whether they would have any success in attracting new partners. “They’re such a tarnished outfit that short of changing their name there is no point in talking to anybody,” he said.

Somerset CC said it had no further comment to that provided by Southwest One.

Private Eye reported the same story with a little extra

 

They included a report that Somerset Council are making £75 million in cuts and have issued 1,500 redundancies…..it still amazes me why some people don’t understand why staff and residents are not worried about easyCouncil.

 

Yesterday Lord Hutton announced some key Pension reforms he wants to work up in greater detail for the budget in February 2011.

According to Lord Hutton 12 million tax payers benefit from a public sector pension. That is a lot of tax payers and a lot of voters!

“What he is looking at?”

M Increase the retirement age..65, 70….75?

M Increase the employee contributions

M Cut Final salary and replace with career average scheme

BUT

Attacks on public sector workers doesn’t stop there.

The Con-Dem government want to

M cut jobs across the public sector…….

Before they do that they want to….

M cut redundancy payments

BUT

It doesn’t stop there!

Those staff still working in the public sector face

M Privatisation.

TUPE won’t prevent further and more brutal attacks to public sector workers terms and conditions.

AND

What about the pensions for those public sector workers working in the private sector?

M Rubbish pension schemes not worth joining.

How do I know….Lord Hutton said himself that

M 85% of public sector workers are in a Pension scheme as opposed to

M 25% in the private sector.

The Future for public sector workers is…….cuts to pay, pension, redundancy and privatisation.

Why?

Because bankers and politicians looked the other way when gross negligence practices were going on in the finance sector and still are because politicians are frighten to regulate.

Politicians & bankers are culpable, they both have had their noses in the trough…incredibly bankers are now looking at receiving £7 Billion in bonuses.

Now they want us to pay.

Con_Dem government say ‘we are all in it together’…when they know they aren’t going to feel the pain.

The wider public still don’t know how this will impact of them, but that time is very close, and it is going to be a massive shock.

BUT

It doesn’t have to be this way!

Public sector workers and the communities they serve are waking up and organising.

Across the UK, community alliances are springing up.

In Barnet we now have Barnet Alliance for Public Services.

Barnet UNISON members need to join residents on the streets of Barnet.

Every week there will be Barnet Alliance community stalls across Barnet. Make time to come down and talk to residents about what is happening to your service.

This Saturday there will be stalls in

·         New Barnet (outside Sainbury’s)

10.30-12.30

·         North Finchley (outside Poundland)

10.30- 12.30

·         On Sunday (outside Golders Green library)

2.30- 4pm

Don’t let the government treat us like mugs.

1. Consultants
 http://www.independent.co.uk/opinion/commentators/johann-hari/johann-hari-the-management-consultancy-scam-2057127.html?action=Popup
 and here
http://committeepapers.barnet.gov.uk/democracy/reports/reportdetail.asp?reportid=9396
 
2. Private sector
“Poor and inadequate” management by the Department for Transport (DfT) of the failed Tube maintenance firm Metronet cost taxpayers up to £410m, MPs said.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/england/london/8544491.stm
Catalyst Housing wins……
http://www.hangbitching.com/2010/08/barnet-council-loses-6m/

3. Bankers 

Bless they deserve it …don’t they????
http://www.financemarkets.co.uk/2010/10/05/city-bankers-to-receive-7bn-bonuses-this-year/

Audit Commission produced a report in 2008 called For Better For Worse, it was damning indictment of SSDP’s

“Private sector experience suggests that 60 to 70 per cent of strategic partnership arrangements between companies fail, and few meet expectations.”

For the last two years the Trade Unions have submitted countless reports produced by Professor Dexter Whitfield.  The Trade Unions have offered another way to deal with the challenges facing public service but do date this offer continues to be rejected.

Yesterday I received a briefing from national UNISON concerning damning leaked internal Liverpool City Council (LCC) report into Liverpool Direct Limited (LDL) which is highly critical of LDL.

Having read the report to call it damning is being polite. It makes horrendous reading for supporters of Strategic Partnerships.

The report found that

1. The council had been overcharged (at a conservative estimate) by £19m
2. The cost of the contract could be cut by £10m a year
3. Transparency and agreement on future investment were problematic
4. There needed to be an effective and transparent governance structure
5. The council could save £23 million annually by taking the work in-house.

Rather than read my rant read it for yourself and make your own decision.

The report is to found at two links

here and here

Barnet Council Cabinet Committee agreed Strategic Service Delivery Partnership’s (SSDP) are the only way to deliver 25% savings.

I don’t how they came to this decision without any supporting evidence.

 

“Baldrick, thanks for bringing easyCouncil in particular ‘The Development & Public Health Services Future Shape Project‘ to my attention.

I have read the Audit report. I have seen the articles in the Guardian and the local newspapers here and here 

It is clear this is the biggest stitch up in the history of stitch ups and I know a stitch up when I see one….yes, I think this could be an even bigger stitch up than when Mrs Miggins won the pie making championship in 1569 defeating the previous nine time winner Sweeney Todd!

I am reminded of my old friend General Melchett before he went doolally became a member of the House of Lords. His philosophy when facing difficult decisions, which I sense has influenced this report was:

“If nothing else works, a total pig-headed unwillingness to look facts in the face will see us through.”

So endeth my first consultation,…….money back if not satisfied…not a chance!.”

The Development & Public Health Services Future Shape Project formerly known as the Regulatory Services Bundle was published online here

Open the PDf and scroll down to page 20. Click on the table entitled Options Scoring Matrix. Copy and paste into a word document and ‘Hey Presto’ you can see the scoring.

I have never seen this sort of thing before, is it deliberate or is it a mistake and why should the details be secret?

The Trade Unions will be producing a report in response to the Options Appraisal which even from a cursory glance is full of contradictions assumptions without supporting evidence and quite insulting to staff. Just what were thinking when they wrote this “But it is also very clear that the services require a fresh injection of intellectual capital..”

Many of our members working in this area have let me know they have been hurt by this comment.

If I was a Barnet tax payer I would be pleased to see that almost all of these services are  high performing and low cost. It is difficult to see where the 25% cuts and the 20% profits for the private sector are going to come from……or is it?

Answers on a postcard.

My guess it has to be staffing or something more fundamental a cut back on what is provided.

It is not too late if you have any question on the content of this Options appraisal please send your comments to john.burgess@barnetunison.org.uk

On a dark rainy September evening 30 people took the trouble to navigate their way through terrible traffic to attend the Barnet Alliance 4 Public Services first planning meeting in South Friern Library. After introductions the meeting discussed the idea of a public march and demonstration in leafy Barnet.

 

One 88 year old resident explained how last Saturday, she and her husband took a petition to save the local post office out in Muswell Hill and got over 100 signatures. It was fantastic to listen to staff and residents who are prepared to offer their own time to make the Alliance a success.

 

There was a common feeling that people are sick and tired of the constant talk of cuts, and want to fight back.

 

The meeting agreed that a number of activities, including organising community stalls in town centres across Barnet. There were a lot of exciting ideas as to how to capture the attention of residents and staff working in public services in Barnet.

 

All I can say is look out Barnet!

 

Barnet Alliance is up and running……..