Public meeting on cuts to adult social care – Liverpool 10/5/12

Liverpool Against the Cuts and Social Work Action Network have called a public meeting on cuts to adult social care in Jack Jones House (the Unite building) at 7pm.

The Labour controlled Liverpool City Council have already implemented some cuts:

• Removal of service provision for some groups of people. 66 people have already been ‘reassessed’ by the council and lost services;
• Closure of 6 out of 12 day care centres for adults with disabilities and older people;
• Supported accommodation facility Besford House has gone out for tender to the private sector;
• Potential privatisation and closure/reduction of various other adult social care services including mental health day care services.

And plans to implement more. As care workers, we need to get involved in direct action against all cuts, in solidarity with each other and the whole of the working class.

AFG pay cuts – demonstration in Burnley 20/4/12

A demonstration against pay cuts for support workers has been called in Burnley on the 20th of April at Chaddersly House on Manchester Road at 12pm.

Many support workers in Burnley were TUPE transferred from NHS services when AFG took over the contracts, as such they are facing some of the most brutal pay cuts of around 40%. These cuts will put already overworked and underpaid support workers at serious risk of losing their homes.

Those who can’t make it can show their support on the day by e-mailing AFG at mail@alternativefuturesgroup.org.uk

The demonstration can be found as an event page on facebook.

AFG pay cuts – Demonstration at Lancashire County Council Meeting in Preston – 10/5/12

Lancashire County Council is one of several local authorities making cuts in funding to care companies, including Alternative Futures Group. LCC have been asked repeatedly to meet with Unison and affected support workers to discuss the damaging effects of AFG passing these cuts on to staff and service users through swingeing pay cuts and reducing staffing levels to a bare minimum in many services, but have repeatedly refused to engage with us or take any responsibility.

LCC claim that the cuts being made by AFG are a matter for staff to discuss with our employer, despite the fact that these cuts are a direct result of funding cuts by local authorities. Because of this, support workers employed by AFG are calling for a demonstration at the Cabinet meeting at the County Hall in Preston on the 10th of May at 2pm both in protest against the funding cuts and to demand that LCC meet with us to discuss the effects that their cuts are having on us.

LCC are also on Facebook and Twitter, why not contact them and ask them why they are making these cuts and why they refuse to accept any responsibility for the consequences of their actions?

Update: There are now event pages for this demo on Facebook. One for the main protest and one for those who can’t attend but want to support us by e-mailing LCC.

Report on yesterdays demostration at Lion Court

Demonstrators assemble in front of Lion Court

Yesterday (30/3/12) support workers were joined by supporters from around Merseyside in holding a demonstration at Lion Court, Alternative Futures Group’s head office.

Prior to the demo, AFG took out an injunction against Unison, claiming that the demonstration was tatamount to unofficial industrial action. This exceptionally silly claim led to the absurd situation of Unison being legally obligated to attempt to cancel a demonstration that it didn’t call for or organise. Support workers from Liverpool also report that management again threatened support workers with dismissal, this time if they appeared at a peaceful protest about their terms and conditions. Despite this, around 40 support workers and our supporters assembled at Lion Court for the demonstration as planned.

We arrived to find that AFG had taken the bizarre step of barricading off the building, hiring security and requesting a police presence, presumably frightened that we might storm the building and occupy it, despite a total absence of evidence that we had any plans to do so. One wonders how much these excessive security measures cost the company that claims to be in serious danger of bankruptcy.

AFG's "hand of choice", fenced off in order to protect it from non-existent threats

After assembling in front of the building, which appeared to have been completely closed for the day in preparation for the demo, we decided to march around Kings Business Park, at which point a van full of police appeared and pulled up outside Lion Court. When questioned police were unable to provide any good reason for being there and left shortly afterwards, looking somewhat embarrassed.

Protesters gathered in front of police van

After this, the demonstration moved to the verge outside Kings Business Park, where passing motorists beeped their horns in support. We remained there until shortly before 3pm, when we left to attend a somewhat lively Unison AGM.

All in all, yesterday’s demonstration was a success, showing AFG that we will not be intimidated and that we do not stand alone, we need to continue taking action to keep the pressure up.

Alternative Futures Pay Cuts – Demonstration 30/3/12 at Lion Court

Support workers facing pay cuts at the hands of Alternative Futures Group need your solidarity. On Friday the 30^th of March a Unison branch AGM will be held at AFG’s head office, Lion Court (in Kings Business Centre, Prescott, L34 1BN), AFG support workers are calling for a demonstration against pay cuts outside the building from 1pm till 3pm.

If you can’t make the demonstration, please consider calling or e-mailing Alternative Futures Group during the demonstration and letting them know that you oppose the pay cuts they are imposing on us.

Contact details for head office are:

Tel 0151 489 5501
Fax 0151 481 4818

Email: mail@alternativefuturesgroup.org.uk

Neil Campbell (Chief executive of AFG): Neil.campbell@alternativefuturesgroup.org.uk

Gill Dolan (Director of Operations): Gill.dolan@alternativefuturesgroup.org.uk

You may want to ask why Alternative Futures Group is cutting the pay of its lowest paid employees while continuing to pay Chief Executive Neil Campbell over ten times the wage of a support worker (in excess of £140,000 per year) in salary and an undisclosed sum in bonuses, why AFG’s Human Resources department have been making repeated threats of dismissal against support workers who speak out against the company or why a charity that, according its own accounts, ended the last financial year with a budget surplus of £15 million now claims to be at risk of going bankrupt if it doesn’t cut £5.1 million from it’s budget.

Facebook event for this demonstration

Alternative Futures Group pay cuts – AFG and TUPE’d staff need to stand together

TUPE'd staff at a meeting in the Oaks Hotel in Burnley last week let Neil Campbell know exactly what they think.

Since the first article on this blog about pay cuts by the Alternative Futures Group (AFG), we’ve been contacted by support workers who have been TUPE transferred after AFG took over NHS and local authority contracts. Terms and conditions amongst TUPE’d staff vary, but some TUPE’d staff have estimated that once a 25% cut in basic hourly rate and the removal of unsocial hours enhancements is taken into account, TUPE’d staff will suffer a pay cut of around 30-40%. This will leave many of these support workers with a huge decrease in income which could put many of them in danger of losing their homes or facing bankruptcy as they are unable to keep up with payment schemes they had agreed to before AFG took over their workplaces and threatened to slash their pay.

One anonymous TUPE’d support worker from Lancashire said:

“They want to cut our wage by £7000 per year before tax (this is by reducing our hourly rate by 25% and not paying weekend rates , night rates or any unsociable hours), also they propose that we work 2.5 hrs a week more, that we give up over 2 weeks holiday entitlement a year and that any sick pay benefits we have are given up “

Some AFG support workers have attacked TUPE’d staff as being too well-paid or being responsible for pay cuts in general. This is misguided and dangerous. Staff on NHS terms and conditions have, historically, been better paid than those on private sector terms and conditions because they have stood up for themselves and fought. We should be working together with TUPE’d staff to raise our terms and conditions, not collaborating with management in a race to the bottom.

Many TUPE’d staff have shown a willingness to stand with us and fight against these attacks by AFG’s management together, it would be madness to spurn this offer.

Alternative Futures Group pay cuts – Don’t sign, don’t panic

Alternative Futures Group (AFG) have now announced exactly what the new terms and conditions it is imposing on its staff will look like. Three different sets of terms and conditions are to be introduced, each with different levels of pay cuts. The hardest hit (as ever) will be casual staff, who will see a 6.45% pay cut, with bank holiday enhancement reduced from double time to time and a half. By the 8th of March new contracts will be issued and support workers will be told to sign them or be dismissed.

Support workers can still fight back:

• Do not sign new contracts, if we refuse to sign in large enough numbers, AFG will have no choice but to back down and negotiate
• Vote yes on strike action, Unison have sent out ballots to members, remember that AFG have no right to know whether or not you are a union member in the event of a strike, you cannot be forced to cross a picket line.
• Talk to your fellow support workers about the pay cuts. Set up meetings away from work with other staff teams to organise and share information
• Contact local and national press to let them know that a company that claims to care is attacking the terms and conditions of one of the most underpaid and overworked groups of workers in the country
• Take action on the job. Direct action tactics, such as work to rule and sick outs, will put further pressure on AFG
• Get in touch with us via e-mail (socialcaretalk@gmail.com) or on twitter (@carerstalk) and let us know what’s going on in your staff team
• Don’t panic! Much as they may like to pretend otherwise, AFG’s management are neither all knowing nor all powerful

Recently, some of the largest construction firms in the UK were forced to back down from a massive 35% pay cut for electricians by a campaign of refusal to sign new contracts, protests and direct action on the job. AFG are no Balfour Beatty, if we have the will to fight back, we can win.

This text is available as an A4 leaflet: https://p.twimg.com/AmXsJMWCMAADRgp.jpg

Alternative Futures Group pay cuts – latest

Since the last post about Alternative Futures Group’s “Modernisation plan” on this blog was written, AFG have issued a further “proposal”, ahead of a finalised version of new contracts which will be released next month.

The new terms and conditions are to come into effect for all AFG support workers in October 2012, with some of the new conditions being imposed on new starters from the 31st of March.  The proposed terms include a 3.9% cut to the hourly rate of pay (from between £6.50 and £7.16 per hour, depending on level of qualification, to between £6.25 and £6.88 per hour) and a 25% cut in the payment for sleep ins (from £40 per night to £30 per night).  As well as a lower rate of pay for all staff, the proposal includes a longer working week for full time staff, leaving many support workers questioning how the company intends to implement these plans without making redundancies.

No intention to reduce senior management salaries has been announced, despite one individual recieving in excess of £140,000 per year (or the equivalent of ten fully qualified, full time support workers).

Alternative Futures Group to impose pay cut on care workers

Not content with forcing vulnerable adults into moves that they don’t necessarily want, Alternative Futures Group has announced its intention to attack the pay, terms and conditions of the ~1,800 support workers in its employ.

In addition to lowering the hourly rate paid to support workers by up to 6.45%, the proposed pay structures may include a reduction in the bank holiday enhancement from double time to time and a half (at the new, lower hourly rate, of course) and a reduction in the amount paid for sleep-in shifts of up to 37.5%. AFG claims that it needs to do this in order to make up for funding cuts by social services, but continues to pay its top level managers six figure salaries, which it insists are “within normal market rates”.

In order to justify these attacks, AFG have launched a sham consultation process, where appointed employee representatives attend meetings with senior management and ask questions, which management routinely brush aside or dodge.  The minutes of these meetings are no longer available to employee representatives or support staff for undisclosed reasons.

Unfortunately, there seems to be little prospect of Unison taking any action over this, as they have point blank refused to hold a ballot for action, despite having been completely shut out of the consultation process.  If support workers at AFG want to fight against the slashing of our terms and conditions, it seems we will have to organise it for ourselves.

Update: This post seems to have attracted some attention from AFG employees, if you work in social care and want to have your voice heard, e-mail us at socialcaretalk@gmail.com, any communication will be treated in the strictest confidence.

Crisis in care: Interview with an anarchist support worker

Originally published by the excellent Fargate Speaker, reproduced here with their permission.

I work as a support worker for a private company that provides social care for people in Sheffield for people with learning disabilities and mental health issues. The company I work operates across the city. According to government officials, cuts to public spending will not harm front line services, workers, or service users. The reality of the situation is that working conditions are getting worse, day services are closing down, and those paying for the support services are being excluded from any of the decisions relating to care they supposedly direct and influence.

The Sheffield city council budget has been slashed by 8.35% for next year, and this has amounted to a huge cut to front line care. What this has amounted to on the ground is a huge reduction in staffing levels, pushing local unemployment even higher. Those left in the job are left with the unenviable task of filling in the gaps, which means being over worked, and stressed. Many care workers, some with over 20 years experience, are finding it too stressful to carry on, and are walking away from the job, meaning that the most qualified staff in the company are leaving, while new employees, who often aren’t given a decent (and legally required) level of training before they are left to work with clients. This is dangerous to both clients, who often have serious health issues, and to workers, who are not given help to do the job safely (some clients have histories of challenging behaviour, violence etc)

Many of the people I work with have been sent into intense panic, fearing that their disability benefits will be cut and that they will be forced onto a work fare scheme in order to claim. This has led to increased difficulties at work, which again impacts upon the well being of clients and staff. For staff, we have been given an indefinite pay freeze (rates of pay are already extremely low – and the price of food, bills, rent etc has risen fairly sharply in recent months) and a loss of a chance of promotion and advancement within the company. The tactics of management have in recent weeks been an attempt to shift responsibility downwards. In essence, this means an unpaid promotion – increased work hours and responsibilities without extra pay. People are worried, and the constant upheavals in company policy leave staff and clients confused. Many people within the company care deeply about the people they support, and the fact that they are leaving is causing massive emotional stress on all sides.

The company I work for claims to be not-for-profit, this tends to give people the impression that the company operates with some kind of ethical policy. The reality is that instead of money being invested in desperately needed equipment for staff (such as computers that are less than a decade old) instead money has been spent on redecorating the offices of the executive managers and the reception area of the company (in order to make it ‘look more professional’ – the appearance of good care being more easily achieved than the practice of good care).

The company has also engaged in the bizarre tactic of employing agency staff to work as short term “bank workers” in order to plug the gaps created by the redundancies they have introduced. This means that for every worker the company gets from an agency they are paying for two (agencies charge ‘service rates’ which are roughly the same as the employees wages). Essentially this means that the company is firing experienced and dedicated workers to employ untrained and short term agency workers, while paying double the cost for the privilege. The reasons behind this plan seem fairly obvious. Agency workers are in a precarious position, and if they complain about being over worked, and under paid then they can be fired with no notice, whereas an employee cannot. The changes that management want to bring in over the next few months require a work force that does not feel secure, and able to resist the exploitation that is happening.