| (24/04/12) UNISON health workers called for "effective and appropriate" industrial, legal and organising responses to "robustly defend" the Agenda for Change national agreement at their conference in Brighton this morning. "We have a government sitting in Westminster which is clearly no friend of national bargaining," noted service group executive speaker George Barron as he moved the successful motion. "And we are facing attacks on Agenda for Change at local level." This morning's debate followed a presentation at the end of yesterday's conference session that spelled out proposals from NHS employers to attack Agenda for Change conditions such as incremental pay increases and sick pay. The latter had been tried by a Manchester trust and defeated and the union needs to take the lessons of that victory on board, said Mr Barron. As West Midlands speakers Dawn Downs noted, conference is meeting "when our health service is facing its worst crisis ever," and "regional pay will cripple our communities. "Our members and the public are being used as guinea pigs in a machine to make profit," added Ms Downs. And, as Frankie England of Wiltshire said: "Defending our national agreement is deending our NHS." Conference agreed and delegates who clearly expressed anger at the threat to their terms voted overwhelmingly for the call to defend Agenda for Change. |