[Edinburgh-carecampaign] Fw: WHY SOCIAL CARE WORKERS SHOULD SUPPORT THE PCS STRIKE

[Danny]

--- On Tue, 28/6/11, SWAN Edinburgh <swanedinburgh at yahoo.co.uk> wrote:

From: SWAN Edinburgh <swanedinburgh at yahoo.co.uk>
Subject: [SWANedinburgh] WHY SOCIAL CARE WORKERS SHOULD SUPPORT THE PCS STRIKE
To: "Swan Mailing List (no flag)" <swanedinburgh at lists.noflag.org.uk>
Date: Tuesday, 28 June, 2011, 20:16



WE’RE ALL IN THIS TOGETHER –  WHY SOCIAL CARE WORKERS SHOULD SUPPORT THE PCS
STRIKE

 

On
Thursday 30th June education, public sector and civil service
workers from four unions will go on strike over pensions and service cuts.

In
Edinburgh the workers at the forefront of this strike are Public and Commercial
Services Union (PCS) members working in job centres and government departments.
The PCS have made it clear that as well as taking this action to defend attacks
on already meagre pensions they are also striking “for the alternative to the
Con-Dem government's savage cuts in public services and jobs”. 

This aligns
Thursday’s strike action firmly with the interests of social care workers,
service users and their parents and carers. Social care services are being hit
hard by the government and local authorities’ cost cutting and privatisation
drive subjecting some of our society’s most vulnerable people to sub standard
care and in some cases, neglect.

In Edinburgh
workers, service users and campaign groups successfully fought off attempts by
the Council to sell off vital care and support services to poor quality, low
cost companies with questionable track records. Since then however the existing
providers of these services have been forced to absorb substantial cuts in
funding that are beginning to impact on the quality of care they provide.
Support workers are being cut back and the use of low cost, unqualified causal
staff increased leading to vulnerable people with severe disabilities receiving
a poorer quality of service from staff they don’t know. Pay and conditions of
the care and support workers that perform arguably one of the most important
roles in our society are being cut back. Union representatives at an Edinburgh
provider of services for people with learning disabilities recently calculated
that in 5 years their wages have lost 10% of their value. This is not an
exception – in many other organisations without worker representation the
situation is worse. 

This is against
the backdrop of recent high profile revelations about low cost, private care
companies such as the neglect suffered by elderly residents of the Elsie Inglis
home here in Edinburgh or Southern Cross Healthcare, the company that put the
care of thousands of service users at risk by selling its care home properties
for private profit.

 

As we suffer the
double pain of falling income and poorer services so do the people we
support.While cutbacks endanger the support services used by adults with mental
health problems and physical or learning disabilities their income is also
being threatened as the Government seeks to cut 20% of the benefits they
receive. The scrapping of Disability Living Allowance and allowing private
contractors, rather than medical specialists, to assess claimants’ eligibility
for its replacement further demonstrates the Government’s intent to make the
most vulnerable in society pay for the excesses of bankers and politicians. 

This point
brings us back to the PCS workers taking part in Thursday’s strike. Although
these workers are walking out over attacks on their jobs, pensions, pay and
conditions they are also taking a stand for disabled people on the benefits
they administer and for all of us suffering the pain of service and job cuts.
The PCS articulate very well that the Government’s excuses for cuts and
privatisation are not justified. Businesses and wealthy individuals evade or
avoid £100 billion in tax every year and the UK Government holds £850 billion
in bailed out banking assets – more than the total national debt. 

On Thursday
workers from the PCS union UK wide and the education unions in England and
Wales will strike the biggest blow so far in the fight against the worst attack
on the welfare state since its creation. It is essential that workers
everywhere stand beside them but especially social care staff, service users
and their parents and carers. We stand to lose as much as anyone. 

See below for
full details of Edinburgh picket lines and rallies that you can join on the 30th.

 

Danny Oliver

Edinburgh
Support Workers’ Action Network (SWAN)

 



www.swanedinburgh.org.uk
Edinburgh Support Workers' Action Network (SWAN) is a network of care and support workers set up to fight the budget cuts and competitive tendering being imposed by Edinburgh Council which threaten our jobs and our service-users' quality of care.



PCS
Picket Lines –      6.45 - 10.15am   -   
Thursday 30th June 2011 


 

Victoria Quay (Leith) 

St Andrews House (Regents Road) 

Registers of Scotland (Meadowbank)

Saughton House

Student Awards Agency (Gyleview)

Forestry Commission (Corstorphine) 

High Riggs Job Centre (Tollcross)

HMRC (Revenue): Haymarket House

National Museum of Scotland (Chambers St) 

Sheriff Court (Chambers St) 

 

PCS Rally
at the Mound 10.15am  -  Thursday 30th June 2011  

 

Edinburgh
TUC Rally at the Mound 5.30pm   -   Thursday 30th June 2011  

 



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