Industrial action looms in frontline care as GMB Scotland ballots members
by Bill Heaney
Home care workers in West Dunbartonshire will vote on strikes after managers refused to pause a controversial restructuring.
GMB Scotland has launched a ballot on industrial action after the Health and Social Care Partnership [HSCP] rejected calls to halt the rollout of new rotas branded as unworkable by staff.
The decision to press ahead came after a series of meetings when, after a long campaign by workers affected, the government promised to look at easing the impact of the changes.
AnnMarie Carrigan, GMB organiser, said managers have been given every opportunity to end a dispute that now threatens to disrupt the lifeline care provided to some of the most vulnerable residents in West Dunbartonshire.
She said: “Home care is built on the shoulders of our members. Their skills and commitment should demand only respect, but instead have been thrown in their face.
“They have been led up the garden path by executives who clearly had no intention of easing the damage being inflicted by changes that have caused so much misery and damage.
“Our members deserve far more than empty words and meaningless meetings.
“Managers will talk all day but do absolutely nothing to ease the disruption, uncertainty and pain inflicted by these changes and cannot be surprised that our members have said enough.”
The GMB union, representing home care staff, has campaigned for months on behalf of care workers adversely affected by the new shift patterns.
It said a redesign of the service intended to improve care has sabotaged standards, impacted on workers’ jobs and family life, and caused stress and uncertainty for those they care for.
GMB Scotland opened a two-week consultative ballot on industrial action on Tuesday, ending on 1 July. If workers support industrial action, up to and including strikes, a formal ballot will be held.
If staff support action, a formal vote will be held before industrial action, up to and including strikes, takes place.
A poll of workers previously revealed nearly nine out of ten (85 per cent) say their mental health has suffered because of the anxiety and stress caused by new working patterns, while 72 per cent said the changes have cost them money because they have been forced to reduce their hours.
Eight out of ten (80%) believe the redesign has impacted their lives away from work while 58 per cent believe the changes have damaged their pensions and sabotaged retirement plans.
But one carer surveyed by GMB said she has already been forced to reduce her hours, while many other colleagues are finding new shift patterns and additional responsibilities too much.
She said: “I loved my job and the people I visited, but I just couldn’t cope with the new demands. I ended up in tears every night and just couldn’t keep doing it. It was too much.
“Everybody I know in the service is either dropping their hours or thinking about it. It is so unnecessary and unfair.”
Some families dread the prospect of a strike by the home carers, given that some of the elderly and infirm people they look after, administering medication and bathing and showering others, plus a “tuck-in” service.
They fear that a large percentage – if not all the patients being cared for at home – will have to return to hospitals or care homes to be looked after.
He said: “A crisis is looming. The hospitals are full, and because beds are not available, there are lengthy waiting lists, which have been highlighted daily by MSPs and others who have stated clearly that the patients in care could end up being treated in hospital corridors.
“This is a huge worry for all concerned, especially the patients and their families.”
Senior officers in the H&SCP are destroying our homecare service leaving it ripe for privatisation. Forced changes to carers contracts without consent is completely unacceptable. Morale is at an all time low amongst our dedicated staff who always go the extra mile for their vulnerable service users. Loss of earnings, unsocial split shifts, work life balance shattered and cuts to staffs pensions are actions by a callous management who have said the “redesign” will cut overtime costs and the cost of agency staff. There is no sight of this happening, indeed these costs continue to rise,
Making money is the key driver for privatisation. Corporate profit is the game. Just look at the PFI schools that WDC are paying something like £14 million a year. And there is a least one full time senior officer whose job it is to administer payment to the concessionaire providers.
But its the same all over. Look at defence where huge profits are the order of the day as share prices soar up to ten fold these last few years. Or roads. How many people realise that we have private roads. No you don’t pay tolls to use the road but your government with your taxpayer cash pays the road providers what they call as “shadow tolls” and “road availability fees”. Or hospitals like the Edinburgh Royal that’s a private business to with only the doctors and nurses employed by the NHS.
But moving back more locally, did the WDC ever securitise the Clydebank shopping centre for ready cash. Securitisation is a financial instrument whereby a financial institution will give you tomorrow’s money today in what is nothing more complicated than debt secured on a property. But this type of thing can be much more widespread. Want new street lights, then a nice PFI type provider will pay for your lights and maintain them over the next let us say twenty years. And what are the costs hidden away in that?
And so it goes on, leased vehicles or any other assets that you can think of and the jobs a good un. And do the punters know or care. Frankly I don’t think they do. Either that or they don’t have the gumption to look around them. Ah, the cuts, the cuts, the cuts, they are all needed to pay for the debt pile.
But hey as I say, how many really care? It’s just raving loony ball pinkos that would think that the absolutely ubiquitous indebtedness to the private finance barons is a good thing. Own bugger all and pay plenty to rent it.