Unite

Workers at the St Mungo’s homeless charity, members of the Unite union, are striking from 30 May to 26 June over pay.

Workers at the homelessness charity St Mungo’s will be starting their strike on Tuesday 30 May, having rejected a new offer of 1.25% on top of the 1.75% already imposed by bosses. Bosses still claim not to have the money to pay an inflation-plus pay rise, but the charity can easily afford more, with reserves of £15 million and a £22.5 million year-end cash balance. In the last ten years St Mungo’s chief executives have awarded themselves a 350% rise in total pay while imposing a real-terms cut of 25% on their front line workers. The senior managers’ average pay has moved from £107,000 to £189...

Turnout for the Unite the Union Executive Council elections closing 24 April was abysmally low. Voting for the regional territorial seats varied between 6.4% and 5.1%. The average was around 6%. For the industrial sector seats average turnout was also around 6%, but more erratic. It ranged from 4.6% to 9% or 10% in two seats. In the equalities seats the voting ranged from 2.7% for the youth seat to 31.2% for the retired members' seat. In theory, some members could have cast votes for up to six different seats. But for whatever reason, this seems to have been a cause for confusion. It is not...

RCN (54%), Unite (52%), RCP (podiatrists) and SOR (radiographers) voted against the government's NHS pay offer

Open letter: GMB, Unison and Unite members reject the TUC's ruling against NEU

The results of the triennial Unite the Union Executive Council (EC) elections, announced on Thursday 27 April, were a mixed bag.

Workers at homelessness charity St Mungo’s in London, Bristol, Brighton, Oxford, Bournemouth and Reading have voted to strike from 24 April to 21 May over pay. A last minute management offer of an additional 1.25% is being voted on by members, because Unite reps had promised to bring back any consolidated offer. Members look highly likely to vote down the offer. Over 300 members attended a union Zoom meeting with the vast majority for a strike. If the digital vote rejects the offer Unite will give notice of a strike starting in mid-May. The dispute goes back to 2021, when bosses imposed a rise...

The NHS pay consultation ballots of the biggest health unions, RCN and Unison, are due to close on Friday 14 April. The Vote Reject campaign has delivered tens of thousands of leaflets across the country, and is bringing together workers from all the health unions to organise against the offer. Places where the campaign has a good levels of activism expect a strong No vote. However, in some areas many members will be untouched by the debate, and, without a convincing argument about how to win a better deal, may well be tempted by the unconsolidated “bribe” payment for 2022-23. RCN members, who...

Consultation ballots on the derisory offer to NHS workers opened on 28 March 2023. The Vote Reject campaign has delivered tens of thousands of leaflets ( click here ) across the country, and is bringing together workers from all the health unions to organise against the offer. The campaign is starting to articulate ideas for an escalation of action alongside the BMA junior doctors if the offer is rejected. The petition for an Emergency General meeting of the RCN has been restarted, and emergency motions for Unison health conference (17-19 April) are circulating. It will be difficult to win a...

Drivers working for the National Express bus company have won a 16.2% pay rise, better accident pay, and higher rates for Christmas holiday working, in a one year deal. The 3,100 drivers from nine bus garages across the West Midlands struck for six days and had stayed on strike while the company offer was voted on by members. The campaign had been coordinated by the reps working closely with the Unite Bus Combine. The reps were critical of the role of union full-time officers in previous disputes, and had failed to get over the threshold in a ballot of members in the last pay round. The strike...