Grampian Health Branch

September 2010

NHS GRAMPIAN PROPOSED SMOKING BAN

As you are probably aware from press reports NHSG wished to revisit the subject of a com-plete smoking ban on all its premises. However at a recent meeting of the NHSG Board it was decided to defer a decision on a total (with ex-ceptions) smoking ban for a further 6 months over concerns about enforcing the measures. It was felt more discussion was needed with staff, patients, the public and other health authorities. In other words to allow time to figure out how a ban can be ‘total’ with exceptions!
UNISON is aware of many ‘exceptional’ areas and has concerns regarding the impact this will have on staff. Please contact the resource cen-tre (01224 620624) who can put you in touch with your local steward if you have any concerns you wish to highlight.

Pension Watch - September 2010

Only five minutes in the door of number 10, and the new coalition government are threatening public sector pen-sions. Public sector workers are fair game as far as they are concerned, calling public sector pensions ‘generous’ and advising that public sector organisations will need to follow the initiative of the private sector who have all closed their final salary schemes.
So let’s look at an example of a private sector pension. Let’s pick someone who has been in the national eye quite a bit lately.... I know... how about Tony Hayward, the outgoing CEO of BP. My recent research has turned up a yearly pension of 600,000 euro and a lump sum of 1,000,000 euro. Plus benefits. Plus some sort of consulting job. If this is David Cameron’s idea of a suitable pension then we my friends are clearly in the wrong job!
Here is another interesting pension fact:
A recent TUC pension watch study in 2009 of 373 directors from 103 of the UK's top companies showed an average yearly pension of £247,785, roughly 30 times the average workplace pension of £8,320.
The majority of public sector pensioners receive less than £5,000 per year. The Public Sectors Pension Com-mission claims that public sector pensions are costing the taxpayer twice as much as previously thought and as a result public sector workers should have to increase their contributions, work longer and have their pension cut. In our ever ageing population, does it make sense to force our pensioners into poverty?
Public sector workers have been targeted as those who must pay the price for the current financial mess, despite them receiving only the mini-mal in pay increases over the last few years. As usual, those who created it have got away with it again, RBS being a case in point, bailed out by the tax-payer and still announcing bonuses of £5m. In addition the Coalition announced that from April 2011 the indexation of benefits, tax credits and the State Second Pension will be based on the Consumer Prices Index (CPI) instead of the Retail Price Index (RPI).
This change will affect current retirement pensions as well as future pensions and will probably result in a further downward spiral.
In the coming months we will receive the Scottish Government report on pensions, interesting reading as Scotland has just finished it’s own pension choice exercise, the uptake of which was poor with most staff electing to stay with their existing pension.
As UNISON members you need to be aware of the impending fight, and to stand together to fight these inequalities whenever the opportunity presents itself. We will no doubt be faced with pay freezes and cuts,
reviews of existing services and a change to our terms and conditions and we urge you to support our Million Voices and Stop the Cuts campaigns.
UNISON General Secretary Dave Prentis warns ‘if Clegg comes for our pensions we will ballot for in-dustrial action.
Remember you heard it here first.....