TUC's support for workfare challenged!

On 1 August 2014, the Trade Union Congress (TUC) made a joint statement with Confederation of British Industries (CBI) to back Traineeships for 16-23 year olds and “show support” for the businesses that benefit from the unpaid labour on this scheme.

Traineeships involve training and “work placements” for up to six months – all unpaid. The TUC’s Assistant General Secretary Paul Nowak hails Traineeships as “an important first step towards the world of work”. But in giving a green light to a new layer of unpaid work in the economy, the TUC is in fact helping to shrink opportunities for young people, undermine the going rate, and replace paid work with workfare.

Traineeships mean that young people are now expected to work unpaid for six months before even qualifying for an interview for an apprenticeship. The lucky few who make it through the interview can look forward to a minimum wage of £2.73 an hour, as an apprentice. If a young person does not take part in the training, they face punitive sanctions. The work placement segment itself may not be backed with the direct threat of sanctions, but, between the economic coercion of a jobs market with so few footholds and the draconian job centre regime, few people will feel able to turn them down.

Instead of demanding decent wages, the TUC is supporting McDonalds, Toyota, Virgin Media, BT, Vodafone, Phones4U, Siemens, Capita, local councils and many more being supplied with unpaid staff for up to 6 months on benefits alone, without any obligations to hire them!

The TUC plans to march behind the slogan “Britain needs a payrise” on 18 October. It seems to have chosen to ignore the millions of us who do not have paid work and instead face workfare and sanctions.

Today as Kilburn Unemployed Workers protest this shoddy deal outside the TUC HQ in London, please contact the TUC via the details below, or through your union networks.  

When challenging their support for Traineeships, you might also like to point out that:

• The TUC’s support for Labour’s Job Guarantee means undermining the going rate and minimum wage too.
• The TUC’s support for benefit sanctions is totally unacceptable. It has recommended that ‘claimants who turn down a job guarantee job without good cause should face benefit sanctions’. Let the TUC know that punishing people by taking away their means to survival can never be okay.

Contact the Assistant General Secretary who issued the statement with CBI by email:pnowak@tuc.org.uk or send him a tweet: @nowak_paul

Tweet at Frances O’Grady, the General Secretary of the TUC @FrancesOGrady

Tweet at “Britain needs a Payrise” @Payrise4Britain or post on its Facebook

Post on the TUC’s Facebook page

Or get in touch with the TUC’s press officers who released the statement:

Rob Holdsworth    T: 020 7467 1372    M: 07717 531150     E: rholdsworth@tuc.org.uk
Tim Nichols   T: 020 7467 1337   M: 07876 452902   E: tnichols@tuc.org.uk

If you’re a member of a trade union, please download and adapt this motion to challenge the TUC’s support for sanctions and workfare.

History of the Blacklist & the MI5 Connection

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RECENT findings about the unhealthy relationships of police and newspaper editors at the Leveson Inquiry, at which Lord Justice Leveson will examine the relationship of the press with the public, police and politicians, and the strange story about the security services and the police in relation to a blacklist in the building trade told on the 4th, March on the front page Sunday OBSERVER by Daniel Boffey, seems now have a much longer pedigree judging from a recently unearthed article in The Independent on the 7th September 2001:
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MI5 offers to spy for private firms

MI5 has told some of Britain's biggest companies that it may be prepared to provide intelligence on their business partners and rivals abroad.
For the first time, the security service this week openly invited representatives from industry and finance to its headquarters in Millbank, London, for a seminar called Secret Work in an Open Society.

The Independent has learnt that in between coffee and a buffet lunch, those attending were given a talk by Sir Stephen Lander, MI5's director general, on "What is the security service for?", during which he said companies ought to ask for help more often.

Since the end of the Cold War, MI5 has been trying to evolve into a service more interested in catching criminals and terrorists than foreign spies. This week's move will be seen as another attempt to re-invent itself as a more user-friendly service. Among the companies invited to attend were BT, Rolls-Royce, HSBC, Allied Domecq, Consignia, BP, Ernst & Young, Cadbury Schweppes and BAE Systems. Of the 64 executives invited, a high proportion were in market development, security or risk-assessment.

'Sir Stephen said he was sure that MI5 could help business more if only it were asked,' said one delegate. 'In situations where we are working abroad,' he said 'MI5 might have information on companies or individuals it could help us with if it did not involve breaching legislation on data protection or human rights.' 'He made the point that, increasingly, organised crime, drugs and money laundering are our common enemy. When getting into deals abroad - particularly Eastern Europe at the moment - you can get into bed with the wrong people if you don't have good risk- assessment information on them. Basically, he was anxious that MI5 shouldn't be thought of solely as a domestic organisation ... In return, he said there might be occasions when we can pass information back.'

The list of delegates gives an insight into the sort of executive MI5 is trying to reach: Nigel Carpenter, BP's deputy head of group security in the eastern hemisphere; Mike McGinty, security director at BAE Systems; Mike Harris, information security manager for Consignia; Michael Weller, BT's head of government security; and John Smith, head of security for the Prudential Corporation.

The seminar was organised in conjunction with the Whitehall and Industry Group, a body that aims to bridge the gap between business and government. Its patrons include Lord Haskins, chairman of Northern Foods and the Better Regulation task force in the Cabinet Office; Sir Andrew Turnbull, permanent secretary to the Treasury; Sir George Mathewson, chairman of the Royal Bank of Scotland Group; Sir Richard Wilson, Cabinet Secretary and head of the Home Civil Service; and Digby Jones, director general of the Confederation of British Industry.

The practice of using the country's intelligence service to benefit companies is one performed in the United States for a number of years. There is evidence that it has used a communications eavesdropping system called Echelon to gather sensitive information on rivals in the European Union that has been passed on to US business. There is no suggestion that the British services intend to go that far, but this is thought to be the first time MI5 has brought in so many senior executives.

Even though they were not explicitly asked to keep the meeting secret, none of the delegates approached by The Independent yesterday [6th, September 2001] returned calls. In spite of a number of approaches, MI5 failed to comment. [taken from The Independent: 7th, September 2001]