The DWP Greater Manchester Branch has organised a national reps and activists meeting to take place at 6:30pm on the 19th January via Zoom. There is a long tradition in the union of reps and activists coming together to discuss important industrial and political issues and the Broad Left Network supports this initiative.
The meeting has been called in response to the ineffective leadership from the DWP Group Executive Committee majority. The Branch wants to organise reps across the country to work together to develop a national campaign to fight for better health and safety, staffing and improved working conditions. These are the industrial issues that members in the DWP repeatedly raise and they want a union that is willing to fight to secure concessions on such concerns.
The DWP has successfully watered down many of the health and safety COVID-19 measures won at the start of the pandemic, such as refusing to shut offices for deep cleans and increased in-person activity in Jobcentres. Thousands of staff are required to attend the workplace and see claimants on a weekly basis, despite record levels of COVID-19 cases.
There are thousands of members employed on Fixed-Term Appointment contracts and we urgently need to campaign for permanent jobs. It is welcome news that 6,000 AO staff have been offered permanent contracts, but around 150 AOs will not be offered jobs. We need a campaign that fights for every job. We also need to fight for the thousands of EO staff who have yet to receive news on their futures. A national campaign will help exert pressure on the employer to properly staff a Department that is under huge pressure because of the impacts of the pandemic, but also experiencing the long-term effects of far-reaching budget cuts.
Those cuts have resulted in a workload crisis across many areas of the DWP. Despite mounting evidence of high workloads, intolerable stress levels and rock bottom job satisfaction, the GEC leadership has not fought a meaningful campaign to improve conditions. It has repeatedly voted down motions from BLN activists in the last 12 months which called for national campaigns on these very issues.
The Broad Left Network is supporting this meeting and is encouraging all branches in the DWP to formally sponsor the event. The call has been met by some of the union’s full-time officers attempting to discredit the event by labelling it against the PCS constitution. We reject this and condemn their assault on branch democracy in PCS. It is vital every branch has the right to organise and engage in open discussion and debate and has the opportunity to respond to urgent industrial issues.
The meeting will take place via Zoom and the log-in details are:
Join Zoom Meeting
https://pcs.zoom.us/j/94373067843?pwd=bWZzYnBJWmVWNU91TnBoT1BhTCtJUT09
Meeting ID: 943 7306 7843
Passcode: 250328
PCS Broad Left Network 