Well done PCS: Court of Appeal rules the government's Rwanda plan is unlawful

From PCS (Public and Commercial Services Union)

PCS welcomes today’s Court of Appeal ruling that the UK government's plan to send asylum seekers to Rwanda is unlawful.

The court agreed with PCS’ argument that Rwanda was not a safe country to deport refugees to; and that there was a serious risk that they could be sent back to a country in which they may be subjected to torture, inhuman or degrading treatment, contrary to Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights. 

In July 2022, PCS, alongside Care4Calais, Detention Action and eight refugees, launched a legal challenge by way of judicial review to the governments Rwanda policy, which is designed to deport refugees to Rwanda without allowing due consideration of their asylum claims. 

PCS was clear that we were taking action on behalf of our members in the Home Office, in order to improve their working environment by removing the hazards and hostility created by the policy; and in solidarity with refugees who were being subjected to its inhumanity. 

In September 2022, the High Court ruled that the policy was lawful, but it quashed the decisions to deport the eight refugees and ruled that they should be reviewed. An application was made by the refugees to the Court of Appeal, adopting our generic grounds of argument as to the general unlawfulness of the policy. 

Mark Serwotka, general secretary of PCS, said:

Although we welcome this decision from the Court of Appeal, PCS recognises that the fight against this government’s disgraceful anti-immigration agenda is far from over.  

It is not immigration but political choices by this government that have driven down wages and starved public services of the resources they need to prosper. Instead of facing up to the consequences of their actions, it acts to criminalise and scapegoat refugees who are fleeing from death, torture and persecution.  

As we have demonstrated through our work with Care4Calais and Detention Action, our union will not stand idly by as refugees are subjected to inhumane policy proposals and inflammatory rhetoric by this government.

PCS Head of Bargaining, Paul O’Connor, who has been leading the campaign for the union, said:

The decision of the Court of Appeal is a vindication of our position. We do not take litigation lightly, but we could not stand by and allow our members to be subjected to stressful, dangerous and hostile working conditions; nor could we stand by and allow refugees to be subjected to this inhumanity. 

The government is consistently pouring money down the drain in its attempts to stop the Channel crossings – none of its plans are working. In fact, since the Rwanda policy was announced, far from being a deterrent, the number of crossings has increased. 

It is time for the government to adopt the Safe Passage policy put forward by PCS and Care4Calais.  That is the solution to the Channel crossings. It is the only way to prevent tragic deaths in the Channel.  It would allow refugees to have their asylum claims properly and safely considered; and would allow our members to do their jobs without consistently ridiculous political interference.

Creativity and solidarity come together in today's Great Strike March in London

 

 Despite the tube strike striking workers from across the country including teachers, junior doctors, civil servants, university lecturers and tube workers came together today for a high spirited and creative march and rally in London.

The video above gives just a taste of  magnificent day.

Here is a parade of the placards that were on display.

 

 

A Just Transition for Aviation Workers - a Green Party Trade Union Group discussion

   

 

The contribution of flying to global warming has long been an issue for environmentalists with many activists refusing to fly, most notably Greta Thunberg, and others rationing themselves to flights only when there is no alternative - although of course some would argue that the alternative is to stop completely, although that is a fraught decision in communities such as ours when families have so many relatives oveseas.

The rise of zoom conferencing during the pandemic may well  lead to an overall reduction in flying in the business sector and those not very healthy 'red eye' flights.

'Just Transition' refers to the demand that the transition to a low carbon economy is only viable if workers in the high-carbon sectors are offered alternative training and employment and not thrown into unemployment.  The importance of the Green Party engaging with trade unions over these issues was reiterated at our recent conference and a commitment made to emphasise work with trade unions and trade unionists in pursuit of a just transition.

 

 

Hear about the PCS union's pay campaign Wednesday 26th June - civil servants fight back on pay & restriction on TU rights

FIGHTBACK IN GOVERNMENT SERVICES’

Speaker Cathy Cross – PCS officer

Brent Trades Council open meeting on

Wednesday 26^th June 2019 7.30pm

 

PCS pay campaign-Repeal the Trade Union Act

Hard working civil servants have seen the value of their pay fall through the floor over the past decade. They need a pay rise. 

Public and Commercial Services Union (PCS)  members in the civil service voted by four to one in favour of strike action and action short of strike over pay. The ballot turnout of 47.7%, was the highest ever achieved, but is still just under 3,000 votes short of reaching the required 50% threshold.

In a politically motivated attack on workers’ rights, the coalition government introduced an undemocratic restriction with the Trade Union Act 2016 requiring a 50% turnout threshold and other restrictions.

 

Willesden Trades and Labour Hall

375 High Road

London NW10 2JR

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Willesden Trades and Labour Hall

375 High Road

London NW10 2JR

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Join Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group actions against Tory policies

From Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group (KUWG)

 

DON’T LET THERESA MAY AND HER SYCHOPHANTIC & PYSCHOPATHIC FRIENDS RUIN US! THEIR ‘IDEAS’ ARE ABSOLUTELY STINKING RUBBISH!!!!!!

The Tories espouse the crap ideas that making unemployed people’s lives harder will incentivise them to get work. For the rich MORE monies and bonuses incentivise them…1 rule for the real parasites, another for people already down on their luck.

One stupid cost-cutting exercise is to close 78 jobcentres including KILBURN and NEASDEN. KUWG have petitioned claimants at those jobcentres and found out nobody knew, as not even in a consultation process, and people signed our petition to keep them open. It is yet another tactic to make travelling more onerous to get us late to appointments or not turn up, so we can get sanctioned. Pure evil! We have sent petitions to local MPs Tulip Siddiq and Dawn Butler and to the West London DWP Office so this rotten government can’t say  that there was no opposition. We will continue to try to prevent these closures, with more petitioning, letters, leafleting, protests etc.

The PCS Union, who have staff in jobcentres, have organised on 28th March 12:45pm to 16:45pm a lobby of Parliament to stop Jobcentres closures...turn up & contact your MP.

Unite Community have organised a National “No to Benefits Sanctions” day of protest on Thursday  March 30th with local jobcentre protests with a demonstration at 2pm same day outside the DWP Headquarters Caxton House, Tothill Street, Westminster. Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group will be outside KILBURN Jobcentre tween noon- 1pm that day.

NO TO THE “NASTY” TORY PARTY, WHICH IS GETTING EVEN NASTIER! Yuk!!

After Paris Climate Rising meets to discuss individual, community and workplace action on Climate Change

From Friends of the Earth, PCS and This Changes Everything UK
 

Please join us on  January  30^th at Friends House, London for Climate Rising,  a day of workshops, inspirational speakers and updates from the Paris talks.

Find out how to take action individually, together in our communities and workplaces; and link up with others across the globe who are on the frontline facing the threat of climate change.

In the morning we’ll hear stories from the Paris talks, including insights from:

Jagoda Munic, Chairperson, Friends of the Earth International 

Daniel Macmillen Voskoboynik, Coordinator, This Changes Everything UK 

Shehroze Khan, Campaigns Manager, MADE

Chris Baugh, Assistant General Secretary, PCS 

Sheila Menon, Activist, Reclaim the Power

Caroline Lucas MP will then chair a panel discussion on the next steps for the climate movement. She’ll be joined by the likes of:

Alice Bows-Larkin, Professor of Climate Science & Energy Policy, Tyndall Centre 

Mark Serwotka, General Secretary, PCS 

Yeb Sano, Climate Change Activist

With more speakers to be announced.

Naomi Klein, renowned journalist and author of This Changes Everything, will join us by video link from Canada in the afternoon.

And a host of exciting worshops including:

Deregulating the planet: trade, big business and the climate

Art, Fossil Fuels & Colonialism

Working for a low carbon economy: One million climate jobs S

topping fracking – frontline battles

Climate, migration and refugees

And many many more...

Rounding off the day we will hear from:

Alana Dave, Education Officer, International Transport Workers Federation (ITF) 

Asad Rehman, International Climate Coordinator,

Friends of the Earth  Francesca Martinez, Activist and Comedian

Everyone is welcome. Whether you’re new to the climate movement or a seasoned campaigner you’ll leave feeling inspired, motivated and connected with the climate community.

Timings:

Registration: 09:15 - 10:00 Ends 18.00

Friends House - 173-177 Euston Road London NW1 2AX GB - View Map

Tickets on Eventbrite £7.27 and £4.13 (concessions) LINK

National Gallery strikers to return to work after dispute agreement reached

 

The strike was widely supported

From PCS Press Release

Our members at the National Gallery voted unanimously today to return to work after we reached an agreement to end the dispute.

 

The news comes shortly after we marked 100 days on strike since February.

We opposed the privatisation of the gallery's visitor services staff and regret we have been unable to prevent it going ahead.

We are however pleased to have reached an agreement with the gallery and contractor Securitas that would mean protection of terms and conditions and a return to work for our senior rep Candy Udwin.

We thank the new director Gabriele Finaldi and the company for their commitment to genuine negotiations.

Strike action is being suspended pending ministerial approval and a ballot of our members over the deal, which also includes union recognition with the company and the London living wage.

Staff will meet outside the gallery at 9am on Monday 5 October to go back in to work together.
More information will be published as soon as it is available.

Our general secretary Mark Serwotka said: "We are pleased to have reached this agreement and on behalf of the union I would like to pay particular tribute to Candy, who is looking forward to returning to the job she loves, and to all our members at the gallery.

"We still do not believe privatisation was necessary but we will work with the new company and the gallery to ensure a smooth transition and, importantly, to ensure standards are maintained at this world-renowned institution."

Green Party solidarity for National Gallery strikers at PCS Rally in Trafalgar Square

As the Conservative Government moves to tighten anti-trade union laws, Romayne Phoenix, Green Party Trade Union Liaison officer, spoke today at the solidarity rally for National Gallery workers striking against privatisation. The rally was organised by their union the PCS and supported by the Green Party Trade Union Group.

Greens support the Public Sector strike in Brent and Central London

Shahrar Ali (Green party) with pickets

Caroline Lucas supports July 10th public sector strike

Get the 'racist van' off the road for good this weekend

The campaign against the 'racist' vans is proceeding on several fronts as the Home Office pilot project comes to an end. The PCS has taken up the issue with the senior civil servant at the Home Office. A 'letter of intent' on legal action, probably under the Equalities Act,  has been sent by a refugee group in East London LINK and similar action is being contemplated by activists in Brent. It appears that the Home Office may not have sought planning permission for the van hoardings which raises questions of   their legality.

The Twitter campaign against the Home Office and the Promovans group has been supported widely and the trolling of the Home Office 'help line' has produced some hilarious interchanges which expose the 'Go Home' message to ridicule.

David Cameron as the head of the country's first PR government (public relations not proportional representation) as a former PR man may count the Home Office campaign as a success in getting the Coalition's 'tough stance' on immigration into the headlines but it has also served to alienate his Lib Dem Coalition partners.

Back in 1964 as a raw 16 year old I went for a job in the PR department of an advertising agency. I naively told the interviewer 'I like people'.  He instantly replied, 'That is no good. To be a success in PR you must utterly despise people'. I didn't get the job - some years later David Cameron did!

Meanwhile Green Party leader Natalie Bennett has added her voice to the debate in the Guardian:

I don't often agree with Nigel Farage, but he is right that the billboards being driven around some areas with high immigrant populations are "nasty" and "unpleasant" (Anger at 'go home' message to illegal immigrants, 26 July). The government's choice to adopt a slogan similar to that used by racists in the 70s is deeply disturbing, particularly at a time when the Muslim Council of Britain has expressed fears about a "dramatic escalation" of attacks against British Muslims. However, it is predominantly the rhetoric of Ukip that has caused immigrants to be so causally demonised by the government and other political parties. Mr Farage has spoken of "opening up our borders" to 28 million Romanians and Bulgarians, as though the entire populations of those nations were about to uproot themselves and move to the UK.

The government is clearly guilty of scapegoating immigrants for Britain's problems with housing shortages, low wages and unemployment. The fault clearly lies with its own policies, and those of the former Labour government.

PCS union protests to Home Office civil servant boss over racist van camapign

From the Public and  Commercial Services Union  website LINK

A controversial Home Office immigration campaign is "political, deeply divisive and likely to stir up racial hatred", PCS has told the department's most senior civil servant.

 

The 'Go home' billboard messages being driven around six London boroughs have been met with criticism within the coalition government.

And some users on Twitter are reporting sightings using the hashtag #racistvan and deliberately wasting the Home Office's time with bogus reports.

We wrote to the department's permanent secretary Mark Sedwill on Thursday to say we were "appalled" that the Home Office had sanctioned the initiative.

PCS group secretary Mike Jones said in the letter: "This kind of campaign will only serve to cause more racial tension within our communities."

It's "deeply divisive", he added, and will create "tension and mistrust towards anyone who looks and sounds foreign".

"This is just a political advertising stunt that differs little from the Conservative Party election campaign messages.

"It is exactly the thing right wing racist and fascist organisations such as the BNP, EDL, EVF and others feed off" and use to "stir up racial tension and hatred in these very same London boroughs", Mike said.

We pointed out that, with a reported 500,000 backlog in asylum cases, the Home Office needs more permanent staff to deal with casework, not political stunts.

Anti-fascists far outnumber BNP in Westminster demonstrations today

BNP demonstration opposite parliament

When I arrived at around noon to today's unity demonstration against the BNP's attempt top stir up racial hatred in the wake of Woolwich,  only 20 or so BNP members were present and 2 hours later there were still below 100. Anti-fascist demonstrations far out-numbered them and it was heartening to see how many were spirited young people determined to show the BNP that they would be resisted..

When I left the ant-fascist demonstration was in two parts with the first, mainly young,  arrivals clustered around  BNP but separated from them by a line of police. The later arrivals, who included many trades unionists, were separated from the others by police vans.

I spoke to an officer just before I left who said that the police were trying to negotiate with the BNP and anti-fascists for each to march in a different direction - but so far there was stalemate.

Green Party supports tomorrow's PCS strike

GREEN Party leader Natalie Bennett will tomorrow (Wednesday) morning be speaking at a PCS Union rally outside the Euston Tower in Central London in support of the union’s budget day protest, expressing support for PCS members on strike that day across the country.

Natalie said: “The union is rightly calling for decent pay for all civil servants this year, while pointing out to the government that this – and many other steps to reverse its austerity programme – could be paid for by serious action against wealthy tax dodgers.”

A union report has demonstrated that since the start of recession in 2008 the real value of wages has fallen by 7%, more than £50 billion a year. The report also found that median pay in the civil service is 4.4% lower than direct private sector comparators. In some grades, the gap was 10%. It is calling for a 5% rise in civil service pay this year to keep pace with inflation, and an end to reduction in pension rights.

The union represents, among others, customs, immigration, benefits and Jobcentre staff.
Natalie said: "Congratulations to the PCS for rightly identifying the importance of tackling tax evasion in rebalancing our economy. David Cameron has said he wants to act on the issue, but has failed to take any meaningful concrete steps.

“To save time, I’d point him to Green MP Caroline Lucas’s 2011 Tax and Financial Transparency Bill, which set out how the government could force companies to ‘publish what tax they pay’, requiring all companies filing accounts in the UK to include a statement on the turnover, pre-tax profit, tax charge and actual tax paid for each country in which they operate, without exception. He could simply move that as a government bill, and take a big stride towards collecting money the UK is owed.”

Natalie added that the PCS call for fair pay for all civil servants and for all contracts to be underpinned by the living wage, would be a small step towards rebalancing the UK economy, in which the wage share had fallen from around 60% to 55%, with a great increase in the inequality of the distribution of those wages.
“We need to make the minimum wage a living wage – that is an immediate step the government should take, but in the meantime, ensuring that government outsourcing meets this basic standard is an important step.”

Natalie added: “It is clear that we need to not only reverse George Osborne’s austerity agenda, and invest in the infrastructure we desperately need – including energy conservation, renewable energy, but also to move towards a living wage economy with jobs that workers can build a life on.”

Mainly young, mainly female and all determined to fight for their pensions

There was plenty of excitement in Wembley this morning and it was nothing to do with Take That's appearance at the Stadium over the next few days.  Striking teachers and other public sector workers thronged the Torch pub in preparation for the march and rally in Central London,  The mainly young and mainly female workers were often striking for the first time and there was no mistaking their fervour and commitment.

There were some brief speeches before the crowd boarded the tube for Central London and one of the key messages was that the strike was not just about pensions but about the whole  Coalition Government's assault on the welfare state. Gains that had been made as a result of the post-war settlement were under attack and had to be defended.

Brent Labour councillors Helga Gladbaum and Pat Harrison dropped by to offer their solidarity and ex-MP for Brent South, Dawn Butler mingled with the strikers. Shahrar Ali offered support from Brent Green Party.

'Lesson preparation' on the Torch's verandah

Waterloo Road's Grouch adds his support

Determined  teachers from Kensal Rise Primary in the front row

Brent NUT, ATL and Fightback marched together in unity