UNISONActive is an unofficial blog produced by UNISON activists for UNISON activists. Bringing news, briefings and events from a progressive left perspective.

Friday 12 June 2015

Early conciliation - only 1 in 8 cases are settled

'The most recent statistics from Acas (April-December 2014) show that nearly 59,000 workers have used early conciliation, compared to just under 2,000 employers and that the number of applications has risen from around 1,000 a week when conciliation was not mandatory to 1,800 a week in recent months' writes Sonia McKay in Labour Research. The new process has secured COT3 settlements in only one in eight cases with another 60% of claims being abandoned before reaching Tribunal.
http://www.lrdpublications.org.uk/publications.php?pub=LR&iss=1774&id=idm19652088&fromopp=y

Thursday 11 June 2015

Public Services are trapped in an EU market straitjacket

A much neglected aspect of the 'European debate' is the extent to which the EU is a driving force for the liberalisation and privatisation of public services. Judith Clifton writing for the LSE's British politics and policy blog, examines how local and national governments have lost power over key areas of public service governance to Brussels. The Council of European Municipalities and Regions has complained that the European Commission 'proclaims to be neutral but in practice veers towards applying internal market rules to public services in an overly-market focused way, eroding local democracy'
http://blogs.lse.ac.uk/politicsandpolicy/beyond-hollowing-out-straitjacketing-the-state/