Nasty business in Bromley

Eviction threat to diabetic carer and daughter

 AS a responsible council worker and trade unionist, Paul Rooney thought it his duty to criticize the policy and workings of Tory-controlled Bromley borough council.  

 http://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/bromley/9139983.Bromley_councillors_to_decide_on_sharing_library_services_with_Bexley/?ref=twtrec

http://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/10632356.Campaign_over__lamentable__commissioning_plans_from_Bromley_Council/

As well he might. Bromley is closing libraries and other services - a day care centre for disabled adults is next in its sights,  - with little or no consultation or concern for what service users and workers think.  It isn't just a matter of saving money. It's policy. The Tory council plans to cut its workforce from 3000 to 300. Critics say it has over £150 million in its reserve fund alone, yet is still refusing to spend this.

Like their counterparts on Barnet council over in north London, the Bromley councillors not only want to cut services to a minimum but to become a commissioning body, farming out work and service provision to private firms who can make a profit.   

You'd almost think they'd be glad to see the back of Paul Rooney, when he gave up his job as a social work manager. 

As for the rumour that someone had said they were out to get Paul Rooney, if it reached him he probably shrugged it off.  What could they do? This is England. Leafy, respectable Bromley. 
Anyway, enough of rumours. Here's what's happening. A statement from Unite the union.
   

Eviction threat to diabetic ‘facing £51,000 council tax bill is cruel’, says Unite

The attempted eviction of a Bromley insulin dependent diabetic, who looks after his severely disabled daughter and was wrongly charged a total of £51,000 for his council tax bill by outsourcing giant Liberata, was branded as ‘ham-fisted and cruel’.

Unite, the country’s largest union, has rallied in defence of Paul Rooney, who gave up work as a social work manager to look after his 14-year-old daughter Roisin, as bailiffs today (Monday 13 July) descended on the home he owns at 22 Yew Tree Road, Bromley BR3 8HT to take repossession.

Liberata, which runs the council tax collection service on behalf of the controversial Tory-controlled Bromley council, claims that Paul Rooney allegedly owes just over £2,000 in council tax. Liberata, it is alleged, has also tacked on £49,000 in solicitors’ fees.

Unite said that the mistakes made by Liberata were in not processing his application for council tax benefit correctly and this resulted in the council tax not being paid on time – which the union said was ‘an astonishing cock-up and a catalogue of outrageous incompetence’.

Pilgrim Tucker said: “Bromley's notoriously bad outsourced council tax collection service has repeatedly messed up the processing of Paul’s council tax, and now his home is threatened with repossession today.

“Paul, a former Unite rep, gave up work to care for his daughter Roisin, who has a brain tumour and chromasome disorder, with consequent physical and learning disabilities.

“Liberata has presided over an astonishing cock-up and a catalogue of outrageous incompetence – it is shameful. It is ham-fisted and cruel.”

About 30 community activists from Unite and local residents were at Yew Tree Road in a bid to stop the bailiffs from evicting Paul Rooney and Roisin, who has a brain tumour, a chromasome disorder and, as a result, physical and learning disabilities. He gave up work to care for his daughter.

Unite’s London community co-ordinator Pilgrim Tucker said: “This is a horrific case that is inhumane and proves that the outsourcing of council’s services to the private sector is a shambles and they should be brought back in house immediately.”

Bromley council is fully committed to becoming a commissioning council and reducing the number of council employees from 4,000 to 300 – despite having £130 million in reserves. The accelerating privatisation programme has been opposed by Unite’s council members who recently staged a fourth wave of strikes over the plans.
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Unite regional officer Onay Kasab, who represents members at the council, said: “This appalling case just reinforces the case that Unite has repeatedly made that privatising council services has been a horrendous mistake.

“Our members at the council will continue to fight for the maintenance of decent in-house council services and the jettisoning of the deeply flawed privatisation agenda.”

On its website Liberata claims to be “a business process innovation company that helps customers reinvent complex services, transactions and processing. Our strategy is simply to create value with our customers by building better services for theirs.”

Bromley trades union council  as well as Bromley Unite members are rallying to the side of Paul Rooney, and have raised the issue in the Greater London Association of Trades Union Councils (GLATUC). They are also supporting a lobby at the Civic Centre on Wednesday 15th July, at 6pm to defend the Astley Centre against privatisation.The Astley Centre provides essential support for adults with learning disabilities and it is now being hugely threatened by privatisation efforts.

https://www.facebook.com/bromleyunitetheunion

Secrecy, Blacklists and Whistleblowing

 THE FIGHT FOR THE NHS

 

Charlotte Munro, public service whistleblower reinstated.  Nice to win sometimes.

MORE questions have been raised than are being answered in the run-up to this election, but whoever wins, we should not let them go away.  We're used to politicians telling us how much (of our)money they have thrown to the National Health Service, swearing how much they appreciate the service, and assuring us it is safe in their hands.

We're not supposed to look whose hands are in the till.   That's covered by secrecy, even though it is our business.

At the beginning of this year came the news that an £80 million contract to run cancer scans had been given to a private health firm with a Tory MP on their board, despite a rival NHS consortium allegedly offering to carry out the work for £7 million less.

The NHS Trust that runs Royal Stoke University Hospital in Staffordshire put together a consortium with other NHS hospitals to enter a “competitive bid” for a 10-year contract to run scans across Cheshire, Staffordshire, Shropshire, Liverpool, and Lancashire. The scans, known as PET-CT, are mostly used for diagnosing and measuring cancers.

NHS England, the “head office” of the health service, rejected the bid and awarded the contract to Alliance Medical, a private health firm whose board members include former Tory cabinet minister and Kensington MP Malcolm Rifkind.

Ian Syme, coordinator of North Staffordshire Healthwatch and long-time critic of privatisation, uncovered the original NHS bid by, in his words, “digging through 150 pages of board papers”. His research revealed that the bid from the private provider had beaten the NHS bid. “There’s little or no openness or transparency in these tendering processes, no public debate, no meaningful public scrutiny. Ask for details and you get obstructed by the ‘commercial confidentiality’ excuse.”

He added: “The evidence is stacking up that NHS England have a privatisation agenda and NHS England are at the moment privatising NHS by stealth.”

 Malcolm Rifkind is quitting as MP - and chair of the Commons Security and Intelligence Committee - after being caught offering his services in a cash for access sting.  The same in which Labour's Jack Straw was seeking to provide for his old age. It must be true what they say about people struggling to keep up with the cost of living, and having to take extra jobs. Rifkind has been topping up his MP's salary, earning around £60,000 a year to sit on Alliance Medical’s board, according to public records.

 Alliance Medical has a turnover of around £120 million a year, so this scanning contract, worth an estimated £8million a year, is a significant part of its work. Alliance Medical said Rifkind was not involved in the bid.

Scanners don't come cheap. I remember the public fundraising effort for one at St.George's Hospital in London while I was still working there, the giant crane that had to be used to swing it into the unit; and then the less pleasant news that local GPs could not afford to refer their NHS patients for a scan, while the unit was trying to recoup its cost. The Royal Stoke Hospital's £3 million scanner was bought in November 2013 with donations from Keele University and members of the public. It would have been used if the Trust had won the contract. If not, local campaigners believe the scanner might either remain unused,  or be brought into the private Alliance Medical’s scheme

News of Rifkind's public disgrace brought an opportunity for questions in the House.

PM challenged to clarify Malcolm Rifkind's involvement in £80m NHS deal
By D_Blackhurst  |  Posted: February 25, 2015

DAVID Cameron has been challenged to reveal if disgraced ex-minister Sir Malcolm Rifkind influenced the awarding of an £80 million North Staffordshire NHS contract to a private company.

The Tory MP sits on the board of Alliance Medical, which won the lucrative deal to diagnose illnesses in thousands of patients for 10 years.

The company was chosen by NHS England in favour of a £7 million cheaper bid from a consortium of NHS trusts led by the Royal Stoke University Hospital.

Now the Prime Minister has been asked to clarify Sir Malcolm’s role since he was secretly filmed offering access for cash to a private firm.

Read more: http://www.stokesentinel.co.uk/Rifkind-questions-North-Staffordhire-scanning/story-

Questions asked, but not answered.

Joan Walley (Stoke-on-Trent North) (Lab): Given that it was not possible for me to raise in Health questions or with the chief executive of NHS England in a personal meeting the continuing concerns about the procurement of a PET scanner across Staffordshire, Cheshire and Lancashire, will the Leader of the House give assurances, amid concerns about openness and transparency, that there has been no undue influence from the right hon. and learned Member for Kensington (Sir Malcolm Rifkind) as a board member of Alliance? There are real concerns about the possibility of a monopoly service, which may mean that the contract will need to be referred to the Competition and Markets Authority. Will the Leader of the House find time for a proper, open debate about these continuing concerns?

Mr Hague: The hon. Lady has raised related concerns before in the House. I am sorry that she was not able to do so in Health questions, because there will be no more Health questions before the election; we are entering a period in which some Departments will not have further questions before Dissolution. However, she is still able to ask written questions and to seek answers in every other way through correspondence with Health Ministers. I will draw their attention to the matter that she has raised. As Leader of the House, I cannot give her any assurances about what she has asked, but I know that my colleagues will want to attend to what she has raised in the House today.

That's from Hansard. And here is an extract from the Daily Telegraph on Rifkind:

During Health Questions, Labour MP Jamie Reed asked Jeremy Hunt whether the Department of Health had any contact with Sir Malcolm before the contract was awarded by the government.
Mr Reed asked: “Can the secretary of state explain why the more expensive private sector bid was chosen over the better value NHS which provides these services?
“And will the Secretary of State today confirm, because this is a matter of profound public interest, that no contact took place between his department and the board of Alliance Medical, including at any point with current board member, the right honourable member for Kensington?”
The Health Secretary responded that he admired the Labour MPs "chutzpah" but said "it all behoves him to come and talk to us about privatisation.”

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/politics/conservative/11431668/Cash-for-access-scandal-live-Malcolm-Rifkind-to-quit-Parliament.html

Tu quoque, You too, might not be acceptable as an excuse or answer from accused criminals in court or schoolchildren, but government ministers think they can get away with it, as though by answering, or failing to answer, MPs this way they can ignore questions from the general public.

A broader picture of the threat to the NHS in Staffordshire - and where next? - came last month, in a report from the Guardian health correspondent Denis Campbell:

Cancer care for patients in Staffordshire could be cut after it is taken over by profit-driven firms in the biggest privatisation of NHS services yet, campaigners are warning.

Handing the £700m contract to the private sector could see hospices closed, less money being spent on treatment and patients left at risk of experiencing poor care, they claim.

The fears follow the publication on Monday of a secret document prepared by the four local NHS clinical commissioning groups (CCGs) in Staffordshire involved in the outsourcing deal to rouse interest in the contract among private firms. They plan to appoint one company to act as the “prime provider” of cancer services, including diagnosis, treatment and aftercare, with that firm then sub-contracting more services.

Campaigners – including Kate Godfrey, Labour’s parliamentary candidate for Stafford in the general election – claimed the document proves that the winning bidder will be “given ‘discretion’ to design services they would like to deliver, slash spend per patient and propose the payment structures most beneficial to themselves”.
Godfrey also warned that front-line services could be sold off so that “core NHS responsibilities such as radiotherapy, surgery and chemotherapy could be delivered by the private sector, with no mechanism for patients to seek redress following failures of care”.

In addition, she claimed, the winning bidder will be “given freedom to alter or exit any existing contract – for example, funding for much-loved hospice care – without patients given any chance to challenge”.

Meanwhile, seven of the 11 private health firms which have jointly won a £780m NHS privatisation contract – the biggest yet concluded – have links to the Conservatives, Labour research shows.

The seven include three companies which have been criticised for providing inadequate care to NHS patients or care home residents they were looking after. Two of them, Circle and Care UK, have been taken to task by the Care Quality Commission for that while a third, Vanguard, is under fire after 31 eye operations it performed under contract to the NHS last year left patients with continuing sight problems.

For example, Vanguard is majority owned by MML Capital. Rory Brooks, its founder and chief executive, has donated £300,311 to the Tories and gets privileged access to David Cameron as part of the ‘Leaders Club’ of Tory donors.

Care UK’s chairman until 2010 was John Nash, who was made a peer by Cameron in 2013 and is now an education minister in the House of Lords. He and his wife Caroline have given £251,000 to the Tories.

Circle, which recently pulled out of running Hinchingbrooke NHS hospital in what was hailed as a pionerering extension of the private sector’s role, is part-owned by Lansdowne Partners and Odey Asset Management. Their founders, Paul Ruddock and Crispin Odey, have given £843,783 and £241,000 respectively to the Tories, and Odey’s firm another £20,000.

http://www.theguardian.com/society/2015/mar/16/privatisating-nhs-staffordshire-cancer-care-harm-patients-campaigners-say

With privatisation comes more secrecy, to keep the public in the dark, and that's not all.

The health service might seem a long way from the building industry, but with construction companies like Carillion already taking over parts of health and other public services, we see what look like some old customs.  Hospital workers at Swindon complained to their union about bullying, favouritism, and pressure to give bribes to supervisors. And now comes this:

A secret letter from Consulting Association boss Ian Kerr to representatives of known blacklisting companies including Carillion, Skanska and Kier was among new documents published by the Commons Scottish affairs committee.

“Every time we turn over a stone, we discover more evidence of the breadth and depth of the conspiracy to blacklist,” said committee chairman Ian Davidson MP.

Dated February 2005, the letter shows that the Consulting Association contacted firms involved in facilities management in the health service, such as catering and cleaning.

Mr Kerr wrote: “Following last year’s meeting to consider a facilities management meeting I am now able to offer the following dates for a further meeting to cover the healthcare sector. Please circle all dates convenient for you to attend a meeting.”

Former Carillion HR manager Liz Keates, who has been accused of blacklisting 139 construction workers, was one of eight addressed by the letter.

The shocking revelation raises the possibility that NHS whistleblowers were being targeted, with a recent inquiry revealing that thousands of health staff have been bullied and intimidated by managers for raising patient care concerns.

Mr Kerr’s letter has led to renewed calls by unions for a full public inquiry into the blacklisting, which has been promised by Labour if the party wins the general election.

“We know that construction workers and environmentalists were blacklisted,” said GMB national officer Justin Bowden.

“It is quite clear that Ian Kerr and the Consulting Association saw a role for their services in the NHS and questions should be asked whether Carillion and Liz Keates did so as well.

“The British public has the right to know the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth about the full extent of blacklisting. Only a full public inquiry will do this.”

The papers cast doubt on Carillion’s claims that it had no involvement with the Consulting Association from 2004 onwards, Mr Bowden added.
https://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/tb9dbef-blacklisting

The government is said to have asked health service employers for protection for whistleblowers. But will that be for those who spy on fellow workers, or report "waste", rather than those who, like the blacklisted building workers, showed concern for health and safety at work, or in the health service, exposed ill-treatment or neglect of patients?

We have seen how government legislation that was supposed to curb big business lobbying has been turned instead to a "gagging law" to inhibit public interest campaigners.

Still, to round off with some encouraging good news, here's one victory, reported on the Left Unity site:

Sacked Whipps Cross hospital shop steward Charlotte Munro has won her industrial tribunal and been reinstated by Barts Health Trust, 15 months after her sacking. Charlotte, who received a warm reception when she spoke at the Left Unity founding conference in November 2013, had worked as an occupational therapist at the Walthamstow east London hospital for 34 years.

When Charlotte raised concerns about hundreds of Barts Trust workers being downgraded and cuts all across East London, she was sacked on trumped up charges of breaching confidentiality. Since she was the best known trade unionist at the hospital, her sacking was a major blow to the confidence of the workforce and their morale at a time of significant attacks on jobs and pay.

The industrial tribunal found in her favour just weeks after the Care Quality Commission found that Barts Health Trust had a culture of bullying, which was part of the reason for it being into ‘special measures’. Charlotte’s victory is also a victory for the local Unison branch and local campaigners who had fought tirelessly for her reinstatement.

Charlotte Munro said:

“I am really happy to be returning to work with my team and the rest of the staff at Whipps Cross Hospital and Barts Health NHS Trust.  And I look forward to being able to contribute to the work I understand is now under way, in response to the CQC report, to bring about improvement in our hospital. It’s vital that Whipps Cross becomes again a hospital of choice for health staff to work in, where they can provide the best standards of health care to our local population, and find a good future.

“Health staff must be able to speak out for their patients and services without fear. They must be free to organise themselves in trade unions and stand as representatives knowing that their rights as a union rep will be respected, and that the role of an independent union campaigning for the interests of the staff, their patients and services is also respected. These were issues at the heart of my case. Its resolution will I hope contribute to building a climate of openness and confidence so needed in our health service.

“I want to thank my union UNISON for its backing and support in taking my case to tribunal, and to thank our highly committed legal team. I have been moved and inspired by the support from colleagues, from health campaigners and fellow trade unionists, and so many other people. It has held me up through some pretty difficult times and brought home that the issues I faced have far wider significance for people. Together we are standing up for what we believe in and this has made all the difference. Let’s continue to do so for the future of our NHS.”

April 4th, 2015

Heritage and Security

SO OFTEN THE BACKDROP for protests, like last September's march for the NHS, the National Gallery, one of Britain's biggest tourist attractions, is the centre of a struggle for jobs and a living wage.   


MORE news for flag-waving patriots and those proud of the national heritage. Oh,and concerned - aren't we all? - for our security.

The Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union, which is struggling to continue representing civil servants  and workers in firms doing government work, reports that hundreds of Metropolitan Police civilian staff face being handed to a private company that is sending civil service work overseas.

The union's ability to function is being attacked by government ending the check-off  system for union dues and taking away union representatives' facility time.  Weakening the union is one way of setting civil servants competing to keep their jobs by taking it out on vulnerable members of the public they deal with, rather than trying to cushion the coalition's vicious blows.  It also leaves whistleblowers exposed. 

In the latest privatisation move, around 500 support workers in human resources and finance could become part of an existing contract run by a new company Shared Services Connected Ltd.  The PCS says this decision by London's deputy mayor for policing Stephen Greenhalgh means a contract would either be given to SSCL as early as June or be put out for a full competitive tender.

"Majority owned by French multinational Sopra Steria, SSCL was set up in 2013 to take over similar functions in government departments and has already confirmed some civil service work is now done in India".

Funnily enough, with all the concern which right-wing politicians and media have been showing about our jobs supposedly being taken by immigrants, I've yet to hear any worries expressed about the jobs that are exported to countries with lower wages and conditions, fewer workers' rights and favourable tax arrangements.

Security does not seem a problem either,  with all our files winging their way to exotic parts. Still,with David Cameron so insistent on the state's need to eavesdrop and checkour e-mails, even if the state contracts the work out, maybe those poor sods in Asian call centres who keep ringing to ask me about my consumer lifestyle will be able to get all the information without calling. I assume it is worth something to somebody.

The deal to take away work from the Met's civilian staff is part of a framework agreement, which the PCS says allows SSCL to take over Human Resources and finance services in any part of the public sector.  The final decision is due to be made in April, but the union says the business case is flawed and it wants the work kept in-house.

All of the Met's "non front line services" are being reviewed to see if they could be privatised, including civilian staff who work side by side with officers in criminal justice.
http://www.pcs.org.uk/en/news_and_events/pcs_comment/index.cfm/met-police-staff-face-privatisation

Turning to the nation's  cultural heritage, expect protesters outside the National Gallery on Monday evening, over the use of a private security firm. The row started last Summer when the PCS union heard that the National Gallery's head of security - formerly with that reputable company G4S- had  appointed a private security firm with no prior consultation to guard artworks at an exhibition, Rembrandt: The Late Works.

CIS Security is being paid approximately £500,000 for the task and advertised three-month contracts at £10 per hour to cover the exhibition, running from October 15 to January 18, 2015. According to the advert, guards were expected to answer queries and provide visitors with advice, guidance and information.

There were soon reports that inexperienced and probably unmotivated casual security guards were touching paintings and talking on mobiles when they should be assisting visitors.  But now it appears  CIS is being given more work, moving into the gallery's Sainsbury wing, without having to tender, and without any consultation with the union.

The union said last year it was concerned about the lack of consultation before CIS Security’s appointment. PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka accused the gallery of “using public money to usher in privatisation through the back door”.

Serwotka added: "Private security companies, driven by the need to make profits, have absolutely no place looking after world-famous works of art, and these plans should be scrapped.”

The appointment of CIS Security came after the gallery's announcement that around 400 of its 600 posts would be outsourced later this year, including all visitor, security and ticketing services.

http://www.museumsassociation.org/museums-journal/news/05082014-union-objects-private-firm-rembrandt


It seems the Gallery and their favoured contractors are intent on lowering pay and conditions - even taking away seats from attendants - along with job security.  For this they are prepared to take a risk with standards.  A report in the Daily Mail  -not normally a friend of trade unions - said:

"The National Gallery’s ‘blockbuster’ new Rembrandt exhibition has been hailed a triumph by the critics, but visitors might be advised to keep a close eye on the masterpieces.

Some experienced security guards were replaced earlier this year by agency staff and sources claim the change is proving a disaster.

‘Five of them didn’t bother to turn up for training, while another has been sacked over a foul prank in a toilet,’ claims an insider.

‘When others were given a tour of the gallery, some showed little interest, texting away on their phones.

‘They have been spotted touching paintings and even caught on camera in the Rembrandt exhibition stroking works loaned to the gallery. They have apparently received warnings to stop, but this is really shocking.’

The gallery declines to discuss the claims. ‘We would never comment on matters relating to individual staff members as these are confidential between those involved and the National Gallery,’ a spokeswoman says.

However, she adds: ‘Safety and security are of paramount concern. CIS Security employees are vetted to the same level as existing staff; they will also undertake similar levels of training and assume identical responsibilities.’"

 http://www.dailymail.co.uk/femail/article-2794915/sebastian-shakespeare-hirst-s-ex-art-costly-couture.html#ixzz3P7mcFWZ2

The PCS reported last week :

We are balloting our members at the National Gallery for strikes as part of a campaign against privatisation.

The vote that begins today among hundreds of workers at the world renowned attraction in central London could lead to extended days of industrial action.

We suspended planned strikes over the Christmas break after the gallery used the UK's anti-union laws to challenge them.
We are opposed to plans to privatise almost all staff, including those who look after the paintings and help the gallery's six million annual visitors with enquiries.

Our online petition against the proposal has attracted almost 40,000 signatures.

The National Gallery is the second most popular visitor attraction in the country and we believe the sell-off plan risks damaging its worldwide reputation. Private security company CIS was brought in last autumn to cover the gallery's Rembrandt exhibition.

Now the firm has been handed work in the Sainsbury wing, without any tender or consultation.
Gallery bosses have also reneged on a promise to introduce the London living wage, meaning the institution is the only major museum or gallery in the capital that does not pay it.

There will be a day of action against the privatisation plan on Monday 19 January, including a protest at 6pm outside the gallery in Trafalgar Square.

Sign the online petition

 http://www.pcs.org.uk/en/news_and_events/pcs_comment/index.cfm/national-gallery-staff-ballot-for-strikes

Making Profit Out of Misery

It's not enough to replace ATOS

PROTEST outside Ealing Job Centre, Wednesday morning. One of many around the country.
(photo Raj Gill) 

ON the same day that demonstrations were held around the country against the French-owned firm ATOS, which runs the assessment tests of sick and disabled people to find them fit for work, the news came that the government is thinking of handing this task over to another firm.
Controversial security firm G4S and privatisation profiters Capita could be in the running.

There were no less than 144 demonstrations around the country on Wednesday. Disabled protestors in wheelchairs blocked doors in ATOS headquarters until police managed to remove them. At Southend, ATOS staff themselves walked out nd joined the protest.

At West Ealing, in London, where I joined the protestors at 8am outside the Job Centre, someone had brought a coffin to remind us of the poor unfortunates who have been driven to their deaths by having benefits stopped even though they could not work, or by the stress of the tests they faced.

Besides the red flags of Unite the Union's Community branch, a PCS civil service union member with his flag, and Ealing trades union council members with their banner, a woman arrived dressed as the grim reaper, complete with scythe, to emphasise the  point. The mood of the disabled demonstrators particularly was spirited, angry and defiant. The response of the passing public, whether taking leaflets or sounding car and bus horns, was sympathetic.

Despite persistent propaganda against "scroungers", people have been hearing about some of the things really going on. Yesterday's Mirror described how a 50 year old man in Stoke on Trent, who had lied about his ill health in a desperate attempt to find work, was sacked because of epileptic fits, and had to claim benefits. But then his benefits were stopped because ATOS had decided he was fit for work. Fortunately his benefits have now been reinstated after an appeal.

But as Eve Turner, of Ealing trades council told us on Wednesday, though half the people stopped by ATOS have won their appeals, many people have died in destitution waiting for their appeals to be heard. The government is even considering making claimants pay for their appeals, in the same way it has moved against workers wanting to bring wrongful dismissal cases to tribunals.  



Campaigners estimate that more than 10,000 disabled people have died after ATOS work capability assessment. This may include people who were in the final stages of serious illnesses and dying anyway, though ATOS assessed them fit for work, and people who committed suicide because of the way they were treated. 

This government, like its predecessor, claims it is about helping people off dependency and into paid work. The same government has presided over the closure of more than 50 Remploy workshops which provided useful, often skilled, employment to people with disabilities.
.
ATOS is not helping people find jobs, other than its own staff, it is an IT firm which saw the profits to made from Britain's "austerity" policies, and set up ATOS Healthcare though it does not care for anyone's health. It has been given the job of getting people off benefits, and is being paid  £100 million a year from the taxpayer, while job centre staff are among public servants whom the government is laying off. Its staff have targets to meet, and not much in the way of qualifications, so that its costing the public upwards of £50 million a year in appeals against flawed decisions. But perhaps this government has plans for that too.

The object is to drive people into desperate poverty, provide employers with a ready supply of cheap, sackable, labour, (witness the way people have been sent to work for their dole), and make sure that however much misery is caused by austerity policies for the mass of people, they can still be a source of profit for the government's chums. If this game of robbing the poor to pay the rich more causes thousands of deaths, well that's not just collateral. It is one way of getting a result.

Labour, which introduced the work capability assessments - and commenced the rundown of Remploy - says now it would remove ATOS. There are reports -possibly put about by the company itself, that it wants to move out of this work. The government is letting it be known that it has other bidders in mind. But however awful the ATOS record is, replacing it with another capitalist firm out for profit from misery is not the answer we want.

One of the companies mentioned is security giant G4S, whose CV, beside the Olympic debacle when it failed to recruit enough staff, has included deaths of asylum seekers from here to  Australia's Manus Island facility in Papua, New Guinea. Just the kind of reliable, sensitive hands to which we can entrust disabled or mentally ill members of the community to be looked after.

Why can't people's health and fitness be assessed if necessary by their GPs or other qualified professionals employed by the National Health Service? Why can't those who need help back into work be assisted by properly trained, in-house employment staff, dedicated to public service, and not to chasing degrading targets or private profit?  Could it be this contradicts the government's aim of getting rid of civil service trade unionists?

We need not just a change of  government, but a change of direction and policy. And till we get both, let's hear it for the resistance!  

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-26287199

http://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/atos-itself-not-fit-for-work-disability-benefit-test-provider-may-finally-have-contract-terminated-9136353.html

Olympic Security Shambles. When capitalists cock up, they send for the Army!

MISSILES on two blocks of flats (though, as fellow blogger Madame Miaow notes, "none on the posh blocks lining the Thames"), a warship, HMS Ocean, in the river, and thousands of troops -some fresh back from Afghanistan - drafted in to man checkpoints and guard the Games. No wonder some people are renaming the London Olympics the East London Military Tattoo.

That's an extra 3,500 troops on top of those already planned, a decision taken with only two weeks to go after it became clear private security giant G4S just has not recruited enough personnel.

'The home secretary, Theresa May, has insisted the late decision to call up 3,500 troops to guard the Olympics was not a shambles and claimed that the need for the extra military personnel "only crystallised 24 hours ago".

She repeatedly refused to spell out what penalties the private security firm G4S would face for failing to provide the necessary trained security guards to meet their 10,000 target, insisting that the £283m contract was with Locog, the Olympics organising committee, and not the Home Office. She added that the taxpayer would not face an extra bill for the decision"

The news prompted one Facebook friend to post this sympathetic letter:

Dear Serving Soldier,

I appreciate that you may be a bit busy at the moment, but just before I give you the sack would you mind awfully helping out at a small sporting event we are holding in London this month. You see I have just spent £475,000,000 on a private firm to do the security but they trousered the money and cannot commit. I have managed to wangle an old warehouse for your accommodation & some rat packs for food, but you should be used to that by now.(Gotta keep the cost down L.O.L).

Many thanks,
David Cameron.

P.S. You're my favourites!

Apparently those squaddies who were expecting some well-earned leave have been told they will have to wait until some time after the Games, and by way of making it up them there will be another 14,000 Olympic tickets made available to the forces. Bet that cheers them up no end.

Meantime, beside geting used sooner than we expected to the sight of soldiers on the street, we are having a grandstand view of how marvellously private enterprise can be trusted to run massive publicly-funded projects.

We've been hearing more about G4S prepared for the Olympics.

Guards told how, with 14 days to go until the Olympics opening ceremony, they had received no schedules, uniforms or training on x-ray machines. Others said they had been allocated to venues hundreds of miles from where they lived, been sent rotas intended for other employees, and offered shifts after they had failed G4S's own vetting.

The West Midlands Police Federation reported that its officers were being prepared to guard the Ricoh Arena in Coventry, which will host the football tournament, amid concerns G4S would not be able to cover the security requirements.

"We have to find officers until the army arrives and we don't know where we are going to find them from," said Chris Jones, secretary of the federation.

G4S has got a £284m contract to provide 13,700 guards, but only has 4,000 in place. It says a further 9,000 are in the pipeline.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/jul/12/london-2012-g4s-security-crisis

A former police sergeant who signed up to work for G4S at the Olympics has told how he withdrew his application over fears the recruitment process was "totally chaotic" and the firm was simply looking for cheap labour.

Robert Brown, who served for 30 years with Kent police, claimed he knew many other retired officers who had decided against working at the Games for the same reasons.

He said he had been given verbal commitments that staff would be paid £14 an hour, but that the contract he received said he would be entitled to £6.05 an hour for working outside the venues, and £8.50 for working inside the stadium.

"It is actually very sad," Brown said. "I was looking forward to working at this historic event, but it would have been a waste of my time. The public needs to be aware of this."

Brown has grade one private security qualifications and worked for the Home Office, advising on covert operations, after he left the police.

He said he applied to G4S when the adverts started to appear in November last year. But he was not called for interview in Stratford, east London, until February.

"They were trying to process hundreds of people and we had to fill out endless forms. It was totally chaotic and it was obvious to me that this was being done too quickly and too late," Brown said.

The first training day involved presentations on how to be polite to members of the public, and follow-up training on how to pat people down.

"The instructors had been given a script that they had to stick to, and if you asked a question, they would not be able to give you an answer. The training was very basic and minimal. Having undergone their training I realised that they only wanted cheap labour.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/2012/jul/12/g4s-olympic-security-recruitment-chaotic?intcmp=239

It was reported tonight that the government knew, or should have known, G4S was having problems, back in April. Not just in the last 24 hours, as claimed by Theresa May. Evidently they were reluctant to admit that a capitalist company - the world's biggest security firm, and second biggest employer, just could not cope.

It could be worse. We could be talking about education, or the National Health Service. Matter of fact, in some parts of the country G4S is running the ambulance service. The company lost some work deporting immigrants after a man called Jimmy Mubenga died from asphyxiation while being handled by two of its guards. But it still runs some detention centres, including including the Cedars where families including children are detained. (Isn't it charming the way such places retain names that sound like comfy country homes, or places where elderly relatives are left to die?)

In Lincolnshire some police functions have been 'outsourced' to G4S, though Surrey police are reported to be having second thoughts about such an arrangement with G4S.

Meanwhile firms like Prospects which sent young people up to work for Jubilee security for nothing are being allowed to run schools, while Labour - or at least its MP Stephen Twigg - thinks that job too could be handed over to the army. It would be too much to expect our top politicians to have learnt anything from the shambles they have helped create.

Meanwhile, if all that sport - or manning security - makes you thirsty, you can forget your London Pride ...

...GOING for Exmoor Gold, or any other decent ale. As that esteemed journal, the London Drinker, published by the Campaign for Real Ale here in the capital, informs us:

The 2012 Olympics, a showcase for London and the rest of Britain, will be dominated by one beer brand – Heineken lager brewed in the Netherlands. Heineken’s domination extends beyond the Olympic Stadium in Stratford, east London, to all the venues for the games, including Lord’s, the home of English cricket.

Heineken has “sole pouring rights” at Olympic events. The London 2012 Organising Committee has three tiers of sponsorship deals for the games. The committee won’t reveal the sums of money involved but it’s understood that Heineken is a “tier three” sponsor, costing the Dutch firm £10m.

The package gives Heineken the rights to also sell two other brands in its portfolio, John Smith’s Smoothflow and Strongbow cider – but neither of the brands can be named. John Smith’s will be labelled “British Bitter” and Strongbow will be called “Cider”.

At Lord’s where Marston’s has the beer concession to sell Pedigree Bitter and is the official sponsor of the England cricket team, handpumps will be removed while the archery competition takes place during the Olympics. Portraits of cricketer Matthew Hoggard, Marston’s “beer ambassador”, will be covered up.

Visitors to the world-famous cricket ground, with its long tradition of ale drinking, will be offered Dutch lager and anonymous keg bitter and cider. But cask Pedigree will be available in the Lord’s Tavern, the bar and restaurant complex alongside the main entrance to the ground.

http://www.camralondon.org.uk/viewnode.php?id=1268

Workers win Freedom from McFries

It seems workers have won one small victory for freedom and good taste against the tat of sponsorship and monopoly.

Chip-hungry Olympic workers celebrate freedom from McDonald's monopoly

Staff working on opening and closing ceremonies allowed to eat chips served outside branches of fast food chain

The great British chip claims partial victory over McDonald's.

The great London 2012 Olympic chip embargo has cracked. No longer will hungry workers at the games be denied pie and chips, chicken and chips or even just chips because of a monopoly enforced by McDonald's, a major sponsor.

On Wednesday, the London Organising Committee responded to plaintive cries of caterers who had grown tired of receiving "grief" from chip-hungry staff working on the opening and closing ceremonies and allowed chips to be served outside branches of the fast food chain McDonald's.

It all results from one of the stranger twists of Olympic planning. McDonald's sponsorship deal included the exclusive right to sell chips in and around Olympic venues. Other caterers had negotiated special rights to serve chips with fish – but not chips on their own, or with anything else.

Cue frustrated scenes at the lunch counter in the ceremonies catering area where staff were toiling over the staging for Danny Boyle's 27 July opening extravaganza. "Please understand this is not the decision of the staff who are serving up your meals who, given the choice, would gladly give it to you, however they are not allowed to," read a notice pinned up by staff. "Please do not give the staff grief, this will only lead to us removing fish and chips completely."

"It's sorted," said a spokesman for Locog. "We have spoken to McDonald's about it."

But the embargo will hold in other areas. That means no chips with anything other than fish anywhere else in the park unless spectators dine at McDonald's.

On Wednesday catering staff in the media centre were taking no risks. There were hash browns and dauphinoise, but no chips. A server explained why: "Because McDonald's own the rights, so we're not allowed to".

http://www.guardian.co.uk/uk/2012/jul/11/mcdonalds-olympics-chips

They may not call them "French Fries" anymore ( for which I am sure many French connoiseurs of les frittes are glad), but whatever McDonalds serve they are fries, and not chips.

It may have been an immigrant from Holland to the East End who hit on the idea of selling fried potatoes with fish, but since then as everyone in Stratford knows, chips have become thoroughly British, even if the best ones I've tasted in England, apart from my Mum's and my own, were from Greek Cypriot or Italian-run fish restaurants.

I'll give McDonalds marks for chutzpah, and the Olympic organisers for obseqiousness in allowing them and the aforementioned multinational brewers to pass off such travesties.

Apologies to those of you already put off by the Bhopal and sweatshop aspects of Olympic sponsorship if you feel I've only dealt with lighter aspects.


Another blogger, and her almost an East End girl (well from Hackney) comments on the Olympics:

http://madammiaow.blogspot.co.uk/2012/06/london-olympics-2012-pastoral-opening.html

And another aspect of Group Four-Securicor (G4S)'s global empire:

http://www.albawaba.com/editorchoice/israel-palestine-olympics-429149

(Go West-Bank young man, and Grow Rich from Someone Else's Country)

Dismal Prospects

LAST month we heard about the young people sent up to London to be unpaid stewards for the Jubilee celebrations, and left to sleep under a bridge before they started their working day. The security firm employing them with the promise of paid work for some was North west-based Close Protection Ltd. which also has Olympic work coming up under sub-contract to the security big boys G4S.

But there is money to be made both ends of these arrangements, and the company which supplied the cheap but willing workforce sent up from the south-west is called Prospects Group.

If like me you can remember when firms were supposed to make their money by making stuff, then like me you might not have heard of them. But Prospects Group is one of those companies that have sprung up to take care of the public sector, and in these days of cuts and austerity they seem to be doing well. Now from leaving youngsters out in the cold it is moving on to freezing out teachers, or at least their unions.

Here is Tim Lezard reporting on the excellent Union News site:

The company responsible for Jubilee stewards rough sleeping under a bridge has this week threatened to freeze out teaching unions when it takes over a Gloucestershire school.

Parents on Monday received a letter informing them Whitecross School in Lydney is to be turned into an academy under the control of Prospects Group – a firm that makes millions out of carrying out inspections for Ofsted and is approved by Michael Gove’s education department to charge for advice on setting up academies and free schools.

And while teachers and staff are unhappy about the change to academy status, they are also concerned that Prospects Group has told them it has no intention of signing a model recognition agreement with unions.

Hannah Packham, the NUT’s senior organiser for the South West, said: “In a letter copied to us, Prospects have said that they have considered the TUC model agreement and have decided not to adopt it saying that they see ‘no need’ to do so.

“We have real concerns that a company with such a poor track record is intending to expand its chain of schools in the South West without an agreed machinery for negotiating on behalf of members.”

In 2010 Prospects Group took over the running of the nearby Gloucester Academy, a challenging school with a high number of pupils on free school meals, with English as a second language or other special educational needs.

In March inspectors found the firm’s school was “inadequate,” “fragile” and needed further monitoring. Their main finding was: “The academy has made inadequate progress. This monitoring inspection has raised serious concerns about the standard of education provided by the academy and I am recommending a further monitoring inspection.”

Prospects Group hit the headlines in June as the company responsible for providing the government’s Work Programme when it launched an enquiry into jobseekers being forced to sleep under London Bridge before the Thames pageant celebrations.

Parents were told of the proposal to turn the school into an academy by letter this week and one parent, who did not want to be identified, questioned why consultation was only taking place just days before the end of term when plans have been underway for months.

A public meeting has been called for current and future parents of pupils to debate these concerns. It will take place on July 18th at Lydney Town Hall from 6.30pm.

http://union-news.co.uk/2012/07/exclusive-academy-threatens-to-freeze-out-teaching-unions/

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-politics-18329526

http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/06/07/jubilee-stewards-staff-treatment-london-bridge-john-prescott_n_1576570.html

http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/news/content/view/full/119935

Swindon march puts the pieces together

FROM a friend out west, news of a demonstration this weekend through Swindon, to be led by striking GMB members protesting against bullying, harassment and discrimination by Carillion, the company responsible for running facilities management services at the Great Western Hospital.

The GMB members work as porters and housekeepers in catering and cleaning and other support roles at the hospital.
These workers have taken several days of strike action standing up to say they won’t tolerate bullying any more.

The GMB union leaflet says:

"Bullying is a widespread problem in Britain, with 20% of workplaces reporting it as a serious problem. In addition, the Chartered Institute of Personnel and Development (CIPD) in association with MORI and Kingston Business School
identified that one fifth of all UK employees have experienced some form of bullying or harassment over the last two years.

"Everybody deserves to be treated with respect at work, and bullying should not be tolerated. Black and Asian workers are twice as likely to be bullied at work, and disabled workers are three times more likely to be bullied. Bullying can cause health problems, including anxiety, headaches, nausea, ulcers, sleeplessness, skin rashes, irritable bowel syndrome, high blood pressure, tearfulness, loss of self-confidence, various illnesses of the organs and even thoughts of suicide.

"We demand that management acknowledges that bullying is a problem, and puts in place measures to prevent it, working with the unions."

Seeing the name Carillion reminded me of the recent Industrial Tribunal I attended where this company admitted to blacklisting construction engineer Dave Smith after he had raised issues such as asbestos safety. Bullying and blacklisting go together. It was about this time last year that electrician Frank Morris was threatened with violence and victimised from the Olympic site in Stratford, after asking about a fellow worker who had been blacklisted.

I thought I'd pass on information about the Swindon dispute and march to friends in the Blacklist Support Group, but it turned out the Carillion connection was stronger than I thought, and the brothers and sisters were ahead of me. Dave Smith has been invited to address the Swindon rally on Saturday.

A statement from the GMB says Carillion's human resources boss (what we used to call "Personnel" when I was a lad) involved in the Swindon dispute was also responsible for the company's links with the blacklisting outfit that led to thousands of trade unionists being excluded from employment. The union in Swindon suggests this may be one reason the management has been slow to meet them on the bullying issue.

"From Dave Smith GMB has learned that a London Employment Tribunal in January was presented with evidence that Liz Keates the Carillion HR Director involved in the dispute at Swindon managed Carillion’s relationship with the Consulting Association. This was the body that was responsible for the ‘blacklisting’ 3,200 construction workers and excluding them from employment because of their trade union activities.

"In February 2009 officers from the Information Commissioners Office seized documents which made clear that the Consulting Association was operating a blacklist of trade unionists on behalf of major companies in the construction industry including Carillion. There has since been an admission by Carillion that two of its subsidiaries had ‘penalised’ Dave Smith for being a trade unionist.

"GMB members are now on the eleventh day of strike action at Great Western Hospital in Swindon. They will return to work at midnight tonight and a further seven day stoppage will take place from Saturday 17th March to Friday 23rd March. A St Patrick’s Day march and rally will be held in support of the strikers who at the start of the a further seven days strike. The details are as follows:

Assemble 11:15 am, Saturday 17th March

Salisbury Street,

Swindon SN1 2AN

Rally, 1:00 pm.

Canal Wharf,

SN1 5PL.

Speakers invited Dave Smith construction worker blacklisted by Carillion, Jerry Hicks Unite and Blacklisted workers campaign, Anne Snelgrove, Swindon Labour Party, John Drake Chair SW TUC, plus speakers from GMB.

The Swindon dispute has also drawn attention to the extent of big business penetration of the health service well before Andrew Lansley's Health Reform bill puts the seal on it. On strike days union members have been visiting staff at other Carillon locations. On Friday 24th February GMB members visited Carillion staff at Darenth Valley hospital in Dartford Kent.
They have also protested at Carillion's headquarters in London, and at places such as Nationwide Building Society and Zurich Insurance in Swindon from which Carillion have been drawing staff to do the strikers' work.

The GMB has also written to the House of Commons Public Accounts Committee asking for an investigation into the siphoning off of NHS cash into tax free scams for foreign investors using Channel Islands. The overall Private Finance Initiative(PFI) contract for the Swindon hospital is owned by Semperion, a holding company that owns 35 PFI contracts to run NHS hospitals in the UK. Semperion is based in Jersey for the express purpose to enable overseas investors to avoid tax on dividend income arising from running these NHS facilities. The ultimate holding company is Jersey registered Semperian PPP Investment Partners Holdings Ltd.

Medic's Marathon for all our Health

HEADING for Westminster, to say "Hands off our NHS", Clive Peedell is honouring Aneurin Bevan, here seen at start of NHS, who said service 'will last as long as there are folk left with the faith to fight for it'.


IN just under a week a medical man with a mission starts out to run 160 miles, from Cardiff to central London, in support of the National Health Service. It's not another charity event. Clive Peedell is not running to raise extra funds, for a service we have all paid for, but to raise awareness of the threat which HM government is posing to our health, with its privatisation plans.

A leading member of the British Medical Association(BMA), Clive is a specialist working in the North East. He will be starting from the statue of Aneurin Bevan, the ex-miner and Health Minister who started the National Health Service. His planned route to London will take him through Prime Minister David Cameron's constituency, Witney in Oxfordshire.

Here in London he will be finishing up at the Department of Health, Richmond House on Whitehall.

This is what Dr. Peedell has to say in his 'Bevan's Run' page on Facebook:

"My name is Clive Peedell and I am Consultant Clinical Oncologist working for the NHS in the North East of England. I am co-chair of the NHS Consultants' Association and a member of BMA Council and BMA political board. I have been an active campaigner against NHS privatisation and market based reforms.

"I believe that a publicly funded, publicly provided and publicly accountable NHS is the most cost effective and equitable way to deliver healthcare to our nation's population.

"This aim of "Bevan's Run" and the associated Bevan's Run blogsite is to raise public awareness about the serious threats that the coalition Government's Health and Social Care Bill poses to the English NHS.

These threats were well summarised in a recent article in the Lancet:
'The proposals are ideological with little evidential foundation. They represent a decisive step towards privatisation that risks undermining the fundamental equity and efficiency objectives of the NHS. Rather than “liberating the NHS”, these proposals seem to be an exercise in liberating the NHS’s £100 billion budget to commercial enterprises”
Professor Margaret Whitehead et al, Dept of Health Inequalities and Social Determinants of Health, University of Liverpool. The Lancet, Volume 376, Issue 9750


"All the key NHS stakeholders have expressed serious concerns about the proposed NHS reforms. The BMA has a policy of calling for the bill to be withdrawn and opposes the whole bill. A recent survey of GPs by the Royal College of General Practitioners showed that three quarters want the bill to be withdrawn.

"In addition, a group of over 400 public health doctors recently wrote an open letter to the House of Lords arguing that the bill will cause “irreparable harm to the NHS, to individual patients, and to society as a whole,” that it will “erode the NHS’s ethical and cooperative foundations,” and that it will “not deliver efficiency, quality, fairness, or choice.”

"Despite this widespread opposition to the proposed reforms, the bill is continuing its passage through Parliamentary process and is likely to be enacted in the Springtime of 2012. It is therefore imperative that the public are informed about what is happening to the NHS, so they can apply pressure to Members of the House of Lords and the House of Commons to stop the passage of the bill.

"Anuerin Bevan, who spearheaded the establishment of the NHS in 1948, famously stated that the NHS 'will last a long as there are folk left with the faith to fight for it'

"In recognition of Bevan’s words, I will be running the 160 miles from Bevan's Statue in Cardiff to the Department of Health, Richmond House, in London over 6 days in protest against the Health and Social Care Bill.

"I am very grateful to Dr David Wilson (a fellow Consultant Clinical Oncologist) who as an accomplished long distance runner, will be accompanying me on the journey".


For more of what Clive Peedell has to say on the NHS and where to meet and greet him, see Website:
http://bevansrun.blogspot.com/

For more on NHS issues and campaigning see:

http://www.healthemergency.org.uk/

http://www.keepournhspublic.com/index.php

Disabled, disgruntled, but not disheartened

TIRELESS campaigner John McDonnell MP has another Early Day Motion in the Commons, and it draws well-deserved attention to an important front-line struggle and some very brave people waging it.



EDM 1344

DEMONSTRATION AT ATOS HEADQUARTERS
25.01.2011


McDonnell, John

That this House commends those people with disabilities who demonstrated outside the headquarters of ATOS to protest at the role of this company in the administration of benefits for people with disabilities, which has resulted in the loss of benefits, increased poverty and suffering; and expresses its concern that a number of demonstrators considered that they were Last week, a group of people gathered in London's Triton Square to protest against the actions of Atos Origin, the company contracted by the government to deal with the administration of disability benefits. Atos have so far carried out this task in a way that has led to many disabled people losing benefits they desperately need.


ATOS Origin is not a company I'd heard of before, but then I don't suppose it has become a household name yet, having only been formed ten years ago by French and Dutch partners, and specialising in information technology services for organisations that are outsourcing.

But Atos is no small, backstreet business. It is currently operating in some 40 countries, and employing nearly 50,000 people. It's revenue in 2009 was €5.127 billion, and its profit that year was €31.7 million (2009). It has entered a tie up with Siemens.

In this country, Atos experience in automated train ticket sales, on which I won't comment, has apparently qualified it to deal with human beings struggling to survive in our society. It is charged with carrying out the government's aim of "helping disabled people into employment", i.e. taking away their benefits.

In the autumn of 2008, Atos Origin was one subject of a government enquiry after Prime Minister Gordon Brown said the company would have "to explain itself", over a memory stick with passwords and user names for an important government computer system was found in a pub car park. The Department of Work and Pensions, who had awarded Atos Origin the Government Gateway contract, later confirmed that the memory stick had only held the data of just a handful of people and all of their password information was encrypted. But Atos also face controversy over the DWP Medical Testing Programme of disabled people which often finds large number of severely disabled people fit for work who then have to take the matter through a long appeal process to overturn the Atos findings. Even terminally ill people have been found fit for work by Atos, Around 40% of cases are won by the claimant.

Disabled people, and organisations such as Disabled People Against Cuts, were joined by members of anti-poverty groups such as London Coalition Against Poverty in a demonstration outside Atos this month. "Yet," as Sarah Ismail, writing in the Guardian yesterday complains, "the mainstream press completely failed to cover the event. Many disabled people are disappointed by this – one person even said they had emailed the BBC to ask why, but had not yet received any response.

"Disabled people following the event on Twitter were shocked when a member of Disabled People Against Cuts asked their followers to spread the word that protesters were being kettled. Later that night, an account of the kettling, along with a photo of the barriers placed around the group, appeared on the organisation's blog, describing the incident as 'a kind of containment'.

Protester Lisa Egan told me on Monday night that she had been allowed out to get a cup of tea. She added: "They had fences around the protest but we weren't detained in that area, we were free to leave it."

While this was slightly reassuring, I believe that the kettling of anyone, however brief, is terrible. I believe that the police need to be sent a strong message that no one will tolerate kettling. However, the use of the practice on a group of people whose health may be affected more negatively than most by the experience is particularly shocking and unforgivable. That's why I was very pleased to hear about an early day motion , tabled by John McDonnell MP on Tuesday, which expresses concern at the kettling of protesters during Monday's event.

http://www.guardian.co.uk/society/joepublic/2011/jan/31/kettling-disabled-protesters-welfare-reform?showallcomments=true#end-of-comments

A participant in the Atos demonstration adds:
"As one of the people at the protest I expressed my concerns to the police that people with serious medical conditions had been barricaded in by metal barriers and was told by the inspector in charge that this was our own fault as we hadn't stayed where the police wanted us too. Apparently we shouldn't have pushed our way through the police lines the way we did to get closer to ATOS's office.

"However there is so much ill-feeling towards ATOS and the way they are wrecking disabled people's lives and resultant suicides and self- harming that it was impossible to stop people pushing past the police to get near the office. The elderly disabled man who was dragged out of the crowd by the police was merely speaking his mind about ATOS and the coalition government. ..

Also while Lisa may have been able to go and get a cup of tea one blind pregnant woman was refused permission to leave the kettle and go to the toilet.

According to the press disabled people's issues, including their suicides as a result of their treatment by ATOS and DWP is not newsworthy, so I have no idea what we have to do to get serious media attention about our causes. Of course due to the repeated disablist reporting in the trash papers the majority of the public has been softened up to the idea that most of us are nothing more than fraudulent benefit scrounging scum whether or not we do receive any benefits".

The contributor had heard that demonstrators had been worse treated in Scotland, and this was added today:

"I write as one who attended the protest outside of the offices of Atos Origin in Livingston, Scotland. When we arrived there were already 40 police officers waiting for us - I do not exaggerate - we have photographs and film to prove it.

We were not allowed any where near the entrance of the building and I would describe the policing of the event as very heavy-handed, intimidating and well over the top. A woman was manhandled by a police officer and is making an official complaint of assault.

We were filmed constantly by police who also attempted to film number plates of attendees as we were leaving. Most of the people at the demonstration had major disabilities.

We at the Black Triangle Anti-Defamation Campaign in Defence of Disabled Claimants found the attitude and policing of the event utterly unacceptable and disgraceful, lacking in all civil propriety and a violation of our human rights to make a stand in the face of this diabolical system designed as it is to defraud disabled people of the meagre allowances and supports that they need to make life worth living.

In spite of having publicised our event in good time beforehand - not one of the mainstream media players here locally or nationally bothered to even give us a mention.

What will it take for you to do so?

Do we have to douse ourselves in petrol and set ourselves alight at the gates of number 10 before you and the wider society wake up and pay attention to what is happening to our community?

Shame on you!

Yes, you, and you, and YOU! All of you who stand idly by and do absolutely nothing to defend us!

YOU are all COMPLICIT!

On your own consciences be it. May it HAUNT YOU ALL!

John McArdle

I know relaying these voices in a blog is not much, but if some mainstream media could not even report that disabled demonstrators were being 'kettled' by police, or draw attention to the private company making millions by taking people off their meagre benefits, this is the least we can do.

On Friday evening, a disabled demonstrator at our Harlesden anti-cuts protest led the chant of 'An injury to one is an injury to all'. It's an old saying and I did not give it a great deal of thought. But what John McArdle says has made me think. He may have been addressing the media, but we can't trust this to them. When we say our unions must fight for their members, we must add, that our movement must fight for all, and not least for our disabled sisters and brothers who are fighting back bravely against attack from those in power, and who deserve our support. It's not just a matter of helping others, after all. Any of us could find ourselves in the frontline.

On a cold night, cuts protesters turn heat on Lib Dem minister

IT was not quite on the scale of events elsewhere, though one small home-made and hand-written placard said hopefully "TUNIS...CAIRO....LONDON!". But about 150 people braved the cold night air last night to turn out on an anti-cuts demo in the London Borough of Brent, just one of the many going on around the country.

Timed as most people were getting home from work and shopping in busy rush-hour traffic, this demo, organised by umbrella anti-cuts campaign Brent Fightback and Brent Trades Union Council, started with two feeder marches, one setting off from Central Middlesex hospital, in Park Royal, to join another from the College of North West London.

They converged for a rally at the Jubilee Clock, in Harlesden, where there was the Red-Green choir with songs for the occasion, and we were joined by a late but lively contingent from MENCAP. "Don't Cut Us Out!", their banner said.

The particular target for the night was Liberal Democrat MP for Brent Central, Sarah Teather, who not that long ago was happy to speak at rallies opposing health cuts. But then she was in opposition, and her party was in the council, fearing it might have to take on services that the health authority was shedding. (For its own part, the Lib Dem led council managed to close Carlyon Print, a council-backed enterprise that provided employment and training to disabled young people.)

Now the Lib Dems are in the government, and Sarah Teather is Minister of State for Education. When Brent Fightback tried to get her to debate the government's cuts, despite adequate notice and offers of alternative dates, the MP could not make it. So last night Brent TUC president Pete Firmin led a deputation of her constituents in to the MP's surgery to express their concerns to her.

On one point, postman Pete had already ascertained the MP's views, having approached her on behalf of the trades council and his own union, the UCW, to oppose Royal Mail privatisation. He discovered Sarah Teather is all in favour, and that was before she became a minister. In line with her liberal beliefs, I suppose, though I don't know whether it figured large in her election campaign, nor how it squares with the campaign which local Lib Dems ran some years back against closure of neighbourhood post offices. But that was yesterday, and the responsibilities of office are different from the requirements of winning council seats.

On the day that Sarah Teather's Tory senior Michael Gove had said all new schools in London will have to be 'free schools' or academies ( a bully definition of 'freedom'!), yesterday evening's rally began with a speech from Brent NUT secretary Hank Roberts, warning against Gove's plan to take education away from elected local authorities, and reported moves involving two schools locally. Hank, who led resistance to a new academy in Wembley, and made the news exposing excessive head's bonuses at Wembley's Copeland school, said the government's real aim wasn't to hand control to parents, but to hand schools over to business. Pledging his union's opposition to all the cuts and attacks on people's living standards to pay for the bankers' crisis, he said what was happening was "class robbery", and we had to fight it.

After disabled rights campaigner Simone Aspis warned that taking away mobility allowances would leave disabled people prisoners in their homes, while other cuts would deny people care, we had some more songs from the choir, tunes familiar but words directed against the government and the council. Then another local teacher spoke about an issue specific to Brent, highlighted by several colourful placards, some showing kingfishers. A nature study centre at the famous Welsh Harp reservoir is facing closure. Each year this facility is visited by some 3,000 children and used by 800 teachers in the borough. "For many local kids it is their first taste of the countryside. For the disabled kids it's their only chance to get close to a tree".

"Cuts cost Lives", read one big hand-painted banner, erected across the road. "Cuts ruin Lives", said another.

Pete Firmin announced that two Labour councillors had joined the rally, then told us the arrangements for people to call on Ms. Teather. After more songs, and speeches from a worker at Brent Law Centre, an activist in Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group, Carole, an RMT delegate to Brent TUC pledging her union's support, and retired teacher and vetran SWP activist Sarah Cox, we moved up the road to the Methodist Church, where Teather was holding her surgery, and while the delegation went in we took up the chants -"No 'If's, no 'But's, No Education Cuts", "No 'If's, no 'Buts', no Public Sector Cuts" , and "Sarah Teather, Shame on You! Shame on You for turning Blue!", as well as some calling for the MP and minister to resign.

Brent Fightback and Brent TUC are urging people to join the TUC's March for the Alternative on March 26.

www.brenttuc.org.uk


Meanwhile back at the Unison branches...

Around 100,000 jobs across the public sector have been cut in the past six weeks alone, according to a dossier published by public service union Unison last week. "This dossier of Con-demned jobs makes very grim reading", said the union's general secretary Dave Prentiss.

"Behind every statistic there are families desperate to keep a roof over their heads, food on the table and the dignity of a decent job. With unemployment up to 2.5 million, the coalition's cuts are blighting lives and wrecking the country's chances of recovery. Sacking workers and closing down essential services will not put the economy back on its feet."

The jobs lost over the past six weeks include 1,600 at the Heart of England NHS Trust, 1,200 council jobs in Hampshire, 1,000 in Norfolk and 400 in East Sussex. Unison said this showed that the £20 billion NHS "efficiency savings" demanded by the government have translated into job losses and "nail the lie" that health funding is being ring-fenced.

He called on the government to adopt an "alternative political vision to boost economic recovery" and keep people in work.
http://www.morningstaronline.co.uk/index.php/news/content/view/full/100140

>With thousands more council jobs threatened, and the government's plan to chop up and effectively privatise the NHS, Unison will have to do something better than wishful thinking that the Tories and Lib Dems are going to change course. Especially when Labour in office was not exactly willing to listen to its union backers or tell the bankers where to get off.

Yesterday came news that should help Unison adopt a more adequate response. An Employment Tribunal ruled that the union had acted unlawfully in excluding four activists from their posts. The four - Glenn Kelly, Brian Debus, Onay Kasab and Suzanne Muna, - were all members of the Socialist Party, and many people in Unison and other unions suspected this was the real reason they were picked on, rather than the charges that were trumped up. All four are also committed to defending jobs and services and protecting workers' rights, against whatever government.

Anyway, the Tribunal has ruled that all four should be re-instated in their union positions and that Glenn Kelly be allowed to resume his place on Unison's national executive. Supporters are planning to lobby the executive on February 8 to honour the tribunal's decisions.

This looks like a good opportunity for Unison to adopt an "alternative political vision", and to back its members who want to fight the government, instead of the union fighting them.

Deja Vu, Veolia

MUCH to my surprise today, along with a magazine to which I subscribe, and the usual junk mail and charity missives, the postman brought a letter from Veolia headed "For the attention of the homeowner". I'm not a homeowner, but the letter appeared to be offering important advice about my water supplies, and what with the weather...plus they generously enclosed a voucher promising "£15 off Home emergency products bought to you by HomeServe".

Thing is, mind, I was not aware until this letter came that I was doing any business with Veolia. I've had 'phone calls asking me whether I'd considered changing my electrity supplier, or if I would like to switch back to British Telecom , but I must have missed the call asking if I minded who took over my water supply.

Or that I wanted to. I know they seem to be expanding lately. I've seen their vans about. Their website tells me that "With a presence in this country since the mid-1960s, we are one of the only UK companies to operate across the entire range of environmental services and offer customers comprehensive and tailored solutions".

http://www.veolia.co.uk/

Oh no, not more solutions! Besides a company offering clean water should not be coming up with solutions. But elsewhere we find they also face problems:

Dubai: Two French transport giants Veolia and Alstom could face trial in France over their involvement in the Jerusalem Light Rail project that aims to link the eastern and western parts of Occupied Jerusalem to Jewish colonies in the West Bank.

Campaigners against the two companies have won a major step in a legal battle in France that they see as necessary to curb Israel's expansion in occupied Palestine, and set a precedent for companies in Europe eyeing Israeli contracts in the West Bank and Occupied East Jerusalem.

http://gulfnews.com/news/region/palestinian-territories/veolia-alstom-in-legal-muddle-1.557709

And here's an item from a couple of years ago:

At the entrance of the Tovlan landfill, located beside the Jordan River in the Occupied Palestinian Territories (OPT), three flags fly proudly: those of Israel, France and the European company, Veolia. Through its Onyx subsidiary, Veolia, which is also constructing the Jerusalem light rail project on occupied Palestinian land, is managing the Tovlan landfill. In a 2004 year report on sustainable development, Veolia announced that its subsidiary Onyx brought "the new Tovlan landfill into service in Israel." Prior to that time, Tovlan was an old, unsanitary waste dump.

Veolia has a history of juggling with names. In 2005 Onyx became Veolia Environmental Services, also operating in Israel under the name TMM Onyx. Research by the Coalition of Women for Peace confirms that the Tovlan landfill is owned and operated by TMM, a company that is 100 percent owned by Veolia Environmental Services Israel.

http://electronicintifada.net/v2/article10027.shtml

The companies involved in controversial work in the West Bank may not be interested in political and moral arguments, but they do have to take notice when investors pull out or if they are threatened with losing contracts in other countries.

With all that worry, on top of not knowing if it is a French or UK company, or if Veolia is Onyx, it is impressive to think they have time to concern themselves with my problems. But as their letter says, worryingly,

"Your underground water supply pipe brings fresh water into your home.

If you are a homeowner you are generally responsible for the repair and maintenance of this pipe.

A 5 metre segment of pipe can cost £620 to replace."

Looking out at the snow-covered ground outside that is worrying. Or would be if I was the homeowner.

But it is all a bit familiar.

Because, as those of you who read my blog back in 2005 may remember, I went on about similar communications received back then, by me and my neighbours, telling us that homeowners were responsible for water supply pipes, our supplies might be cut off, and how expensive it would be to pay for special digging equipment, and offering us insurance cover.

I was worried that some of my elderly neighbours might hasten to pay unnecessarily, but they reassured me that they had binned the letter straight away. I didn't bin mine, but sent a copy to my MP. He made enquiries. It appeared that although the letter resembled a water bill, and was headed with the water company's logo, the company anxious to provide people with insurance cover was Home Service(GB) Ltd.

OFWAT, the regulatory body for the water industry, had received a number of complaints about Home Service's advertising. An OFWAT spokesperson said: "Technically the leaflets are correect in that there isn't a statutory responsibility on the water companies to repair these pipes, but the figures show that in an overwhelming number of cases last year the water company did just that.

"There were almost 53,000 repairs last year - when you think that there are more than 20m households connected to a water main, this is not a lot. More than 6,000 pipes were replaced and in half of those cases the water company picked up the bill.

"One of the things we are very concerned about is the fact that these leaflets are designed to look like water bills. We recently wrote to Home Service to demand they are all redesigned so they don't look like bills in future".

That was on 16 February, 2005. Then in June that year I received another communication, still bearing the water company's logo. It had the water company's address as well. Entitled "PLUMBING AND DRAINS; ADVICE ABOUT YOUR RESPONSIBILITIES". the leaflet warned "PLUMBERS MAY GO AWAY IN SUMMER -PLUMBING EMERGENCIES DON'T". It was signed by someone called Lisa Bridge, Customer Relations Manager for Homeserve. Judging from code numbers this was the same company as Home Service.

Then in November I heard from Ms.Bridge again.

http://randompottins.blogspot.com/2005/11/watch-your-water.html

This much has changed. The latest letter is signed by one Richard Brimble, as "Customer Relations Director, Veolia Water Three Valleys".

A PS explains "Three Valleys Water is now known as Veolia Water Three Valleys".

Well, so long as we know.

All I can say for now is "Plus ca change, et plus, c'est la meme chose! Pardon my French.