Your Choice Barnet ‘Disloyal – Really?’
Your Choice Barnet ‘Disloyal – Really?’
“Your Choice chief executive Tracey Lees said: “We are extremely grateful to our loyal and committed staff who pulled together over two days to continue to provide their usual quality of service to our customers. We are prepared, as stated last week, to meet Unison and ACAS in an attempt to avert further strike action.” (Barnet Press 10 September 2014)
Our members have been in contact with our branch to say how disappointed they are to read the comment attributed to Your Choice chief executive Tracey Lees.
Colleagues who went to work on the strike days at Your Choice Barnet have been described as being “loyal” by the Chief Executive Officer of the Barnet Group. So are we to understand that those who took strike action are disloyal?
UNISON does not find this approach helpful. It paints a negative picture of those who took strike action. The Chief Executive Officer would do well to remember what our members in Flower Lane, a specialist unit for autism, did in their own time last weekend.
For the last 3 years workers at Flower Lane have held a fete on a Saturday which is a community event bringing together service users, parents/ carers and the local community for an afternoon. It raises awareness of autism and it also raises money.
The event consists of different stalls with different food on offer, bric-a-brac, crafts and a barbeque. There is are games for children and this year there was live music. Local businesses were involved in the event and they helped by donating gifts etc. The Mayor of Barnet attended the previous 2 years, but was not there this year. It is a fun day out for all the family. A colleague, who 2 days later took strike action, described it as a great day.
Organising for this event means workers sort out the equipment and supplies for it – often in their own time – to make sure it happens. They turn up around 10am on the Saturday to make sure everything is in place for the midday start. After the event they then stay on to clear up. This means they do not leave until around 5.30pm. The event helps build the team as a whole and from talking to the colleagues the sense of pride they have in their work and their reputation is worth the effort.
Two days later the same colleagues were on strike. They did not do this because they are disloyal. They did not do this because they want to cause pain to service users. Last Saturday and discussions we have had with our members about picking dates for strike action demonstrates our members are passionate about the job they do and the service they provide. A 9.5% pay cut is hurtful enough. For the Chief Executive to imply disloyalty is disrespectful to the hard work our members do.