Remember you heard it first from our Barnet UNISON international reporter Hands Christian Anderson live from the Copenhagen talks.

Apparently Barack Obama is flying in today to seek an urgently remedy in case the western seaboard of the United States literally falls off the map!

‘World is flat experts’ the Grimm brothers speculated whether the arrival of Barack would mean a fairytale ending for the talks in Copenhagen!

Barnet UNISON hopes world leaders do come to the senses and come to a fair and genuine agreement over Climate Change which will make a difference to people’s lives across the world.

BARNET Council failed to comply with disability law when it decided to cut sheltered housing warden services, a High Court judge has ruled.

 

“Sheltered housing residents brought a judicial review in the court in The Strand on December 2 and 3, in a linked case against both Barnet and Portsmouth Councils. “

To read more click here

http://www.times-series.co.uk/news/topstories/4795829.Warden_cuts__Council_did_not_have__any_or_sufficient_regard__to_impact_on_disabled/

and here in the Guardian

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/dec/15/high-court-council-warden-ruling

This is a demonstration to those in the Apathy Party who say there is no point doing anything there is nothing you can do. We still live in a democracy, we can still largely speak freely and organise opposition to proposals. Residents along with Barnet Community Campaign and Barnet Trades Council which includes the local council trade unions have been actively campaigning for this service since the decision to delete the service was made in the budget proposals early this year.

 

What it will mean for residents, staff and future of the services will be dependent on what Barnet do next. As the Council were reported in the article above as saying this raises “profound issues for the working of local government”.

 

A decision to Appeal is being considered, I have no doubt the cost of funding an Appeal will be carefully looked at especially at a time when public spending is under ever increasing public scrutiny.

 

We will be keeping our members posted on any developments. 

 

“Save our Wardens…Save our Wardens…….Save our Wardens…..”

You can view here and here

On Sunday I attended a demonstration outside a Mosque near Harrow Civic Centre. The reason, to oppose plans by the English Defence League (EDL) to intimidate Muslims going to the Mosque.

Who are the EDL?

Well, in my opinion they are a ‘football hooligan’ unofficial arm of the BNP. It would not surprise me to learn that those in the EDL are also in the BNP.

The BNP have decided that they need to look address their image in order to appeal to voters, so this sort of thuggery would be bad for votes. So we have the EDL.

The turn out from across London on a very, very cold Sunday afternoon was fantastic and a big thanks needs to go out to those organisers.

Whilst the turn out was good, what was worrying was the official response I have been hearing to the EDL is to stay at home if they target your place of worship in order to avoid any incident.

I think this is a dangerous strategy which appears to allow these thugs to dictate when and where citizens can go to worship. I thought to myself, what if they had targeted St Paul’s Cathedral, would the advice to the congregation been to stay at home? I would suggest not, so why should Muslims in Harrow feel they need to hide away. We need to send a message to all faith groups that they have our support and should have the right to attend their places of worship without fear of intimidation.

As a Trade Union it is important that we are rooted in our communities and understand our members represent a broad cross section of faiths.

How to deal with EDL, BNP?

It would be foolish to think that by calling then Nazi’s (some of them were Seig Heiling today)

They are much more sophisticated and have recognised that mainstream politicians have lost the confidence of the electorate.

We need to address the issues that the likes of the BNP try to monopolise with sound bite outbursts.  

Today I saw them use the Israeli flag it is obvious they are trying to divide communities. It was good to see a Leader from the Jewish Community stand up and condemn them for using the Israeli flag and promote inter faith cooperation.

I think today was a warning to all our communities of what is to come in the run up to the national and local elections.

Nick Griffin is standing in Barking & Dagenham and I believe this will be signal the start of a London wide campaign to elect as many candidates as possible across London.  

We need to organise quickly across trade unions, faith groups and local& national politicians.  

Unfortunately I don’t think this will be the last time I will be attending one of these rallies on next time I hope some of Barnet UNISON members may want to join me?

 

 Click on Photos link on top right of this web page to view pictures

£1.5 Billion in bonuses for bankers who wouldn’t have jobs if it wasn’t for public money. BUT it doesn’t stop there. Barely hours after news that Banks were going to be taxed when news is released that they are already making plans to avoid paying it!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2009/dec/09/banks-bonuses-pre-budget-report

It get’s better…….

MP’s expenses

You have to read it to believe it!

http://www.guardian.co.uk/politics/2009/dec/10/mps-expenses-what-we-ve-learned-so-far

Remember Monty Pythons “Life Of Brian”?

“Always look on the bright side of life……???

£36 Billion in cuts in Public Services  http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk_politics/8406670.stm

Public sector pay rises capped at 1%

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/2009/dec/09/public-finance-policy

Dave Prentis, general secretary of public sector union UNISON said: “I am not going to sign up to this. I know how our Members feel – they feel angry and betrayed. It is just not on to make nurses, social workers, dinner ladies, cleaners and hospital porters pay the price for the folly of the bankers.

For details of his full response click here

http://www.unison.org.uk/asppresspack/pressrelease_view.asp?id=1674

 

Sad day

I was sad to hear the news that our members in the Welfare Rights Unit were given their redundancy letter last Friday. I have known some members of the team for over 10 years and have been involved with them in a number of restructures and cuts over that period of time.

The Unit was identified as a cut in this year’s budget. UNISON (with the help of our members) fought a long and hard campaign to try and keep this small but much needed service.  We submitted countless reports to Council Committees clearly demonstrating that this is a unique and specialist service.

However, Cabinet Committee did not agree, and so the service finally comes to an end early 2010. 

I want to thank the members of staff in the Unit for all their work. They have shown great professionalism to maintain a level of service when they themselves have been facing an uncertain future for almost a year. It is shame that staff of such a high calibre are leaving the Council.

I want to thank all the social workers and staff for their messages of support for the Unit. I hope those of you who have used the Unit have clear plans in place as to how you are going to support services users and their families.

Farewell Welfare Rights Unit we will miss you