London UNISON Labour link – Living Wage, Metronet, Boris, Pensions, Child Labour, BNP, Leadership, Pay, NHS demo, Ealing & Shadwell

Today we had the quarterly committee meeting of London UNISON Labour Link. Each UNISON region has local committees of elected Labour Party levy payers and nominations from self-organised groups (the Labour Link is also known as the APF – Applied Political Fund) who oversee and manage its regional activities. All participants are members of the Labour Party.

The meeting started off with a verbal and written report by London Assembly member, Joanne McCartney. Joanne is very supportive of Labour Link. Good news that Labour had defeated the “Nasty Party” Tories attempt to stop paying a living wage to fire station cleaners (see previous post). But only by a margin of 1 vote (9-8)! This shows what a threat the Tories are in London.

Joanne also reported on the potential collapse of the London tube PFI contractor Metronet . Metronet freely bided to run parts of the London underground but now claim that they cannot afford to do what they promised at the price they had bid. They are facing going into liquidation. Independent arbitrators have rejected their “claim” for another £500 million to carry out their obligations. Tubeline, the other contractor, has not asked for more money and is able to honour their contract. You may say to Metronet “serve them right” (and I do) but if they go into liquidation I assume that their staff will be affected as well as a massive financial headache for Transport for London or the government. Another PFI success story?

Joanne made some perceptive remarks about the probable selection of Boris Johnson as the London Tory candidate for Mayor. She pointed out Boris is actually a traditional right wing Tory. Also, remembering that Hartlepool voted for a monkey as a mayor, we shouldn’t just dismiss Boris as simply a clown and no hoper.

I asked her questions about current Trade Union representation on the £3.7 Billion London Pension Fund Authority Board (think of a big round figure) and on working together with UNISON Capital Stewardship forum, on ensuring that the London Olympics only source from ethical providers (e.g. no child labour making expensive sports clothing for 2012 athletics). Joanne was receptive and said she will raise questions to the Mayor on these subjects.

We have two members of the London Labour Party Regional Board, Rachel Voller and Nicholas Russell, on the committee, who reported back that Ken Clark (well known in East London as a Labour Party organiser) has been appointed as the Regional London Labour Party Director. UNISON and UNITE (T&G) have paid for a full time organiser to fight the BNP in “City and East” constituency for the GLA elections next year (Rob Chapman appointed).

Rachel as the elected London member of National Labour Link Committee gave a full report on recent meetings including an insider account on the recent leadership nominations. The committee were fully supportive of Rachel and the national committee.

The committee also discussed Public sector pay and what we could do to support the demo on the NHS in London on 3 November 2007. We agreed to donate £500 to the parliamentary Ealing by-election and £100 to the Shadwell by-election (we would have loved to donate more but there are strict limits). There was also discussion about possibly increasing the number of consistency development plans in London. Julian Cooke from National Labour Link gave a well received presentation on “promoting and developing Labour Link”. I had to leave early but I think it was agreed to set up a working party to further this work.

Tomorrow I am off with others to Ealing to “fight the good fight” with West Ham TULO and UNISON Labour link. Will let you know how we got on.