It is time to Unite The Party with Unite The Union

For the past week, I have been reading and hearing about the Labour Party being in meltdown over the issue of choosing a successor to Eric Joyce in the parliamentary constituency of Falkirk.

Today in the Guardian, Eric Joyce himself written a thoughtful piece, full of insight, under the Comment is Free banner.

So is the Labour Party in meltdown over this issue? That's not the vision I'm seeing, but there are local difficulties, to be sure.

Here's my own take on the controversy...

To start with, I am a proud trade union member.

Since I started work, I been a trade unionist.

I wish more worker were trade union members. We're not all about strikes. There are many other benefits, like supporting and representing members in grievance and disciplinary meetings and negotiating pay and conditions.

I joined NATKE (National Association of Theatrical and Kine Employees) when I started as have a assistant electrician with responsibility for sound at Bolton Octagon in 1978.

I've been with the same union throughout my career, through it's various guises until its present incarnation as BECTU (Broadcasting, Entertainment, Cinematograph and Theatre Union). I know the union prefers it written Bectu but its an acronym and as such deserves capitals. And it keeps me and the members ground - we know the community it serves.

I happily pay the political levy and am happy that my small union stands alongside the other 14 trades unions that are affiliated to the Labour Party.

I wish that more trade union members felt that Labour Party membership went hand-in-hand with trade union membership.

i was a trade unionist before I was a member of the Labour Party, which I formally joined in 1986 (ahead to the General Election to support a close friend who was the Parliamentary candidate for Blaby and contesting the seat won by Nigel Lawson).

So onto membership. it is possible to join in many ways including on-line and using a hard copy membership form (note it asks for TU membership, although it is an option not mandatory.

The 2013 Labour Party Rule Book has a whole appendix on procedural guidelines on membership recruitment and retention (page 63-66)

I'm not sure how many members the Falkirk Constituency Labour Party (CLP) has now and in the past, but it looks like many of these guidelines may not have been followed in Falkirk. That seems to be the problem

I know the my CLP, Exeter, has a vibrant and active membership but nowhere near the peaks of the past. We meet most months (avoid election months, August and December) and the regular business includes approving new members.

I can assure you that if new members applied at the current rate it would take many years to give them the working majority to ensure their choice of Prospective Parliamentary Candidate.

Certainly the figure of up to 150 new Unite The Union members - whether knowingly or unwittingly - signing up to Falkirk CLP would not be anywhere enough to have a built-in majority at any selection meeting in Exeter.

And as yet, Exeter CLP have seen no massive influx of new members to influence the selection of our candidate for the 2015 General Election.

And it's too late for them to do so now, as the membership lists have now been frozen as SW Region have announced the trigger ballot process.

And the local branches also have a role in mmebership recuitment, approval and retention.

I am the Branch Secretary of the Whipton Barton& Heavitree Branch and along with the membership secretary and local councillors try and welcome all new members to the Branch. We keep them informed and they are invited to our monthly meetings.

Eric Joyce in this article mentions that "Others found it impossible to find out who the new members were, as the chair would not allow branch secretaries access to their membership list."

As WBH Branch secretary, I and Branch membership secretary have direct access to our branch membership records via the national membership scheme. This is totally independent of CLP influence, although I have to admit you need to know about it.

There are worrying aspects over the Falkirk saga but it points to a dysfunctional CLP rater than meltdown for the whole of the Labour Party

Exeter Bedroom Tax Protest

This afternoon at 1pm I stepped out from behind my computer and became an upfront Bedroom Tax activist.

For many months, I've been campaigning electronically against the Bedroom Tax on social media - questioning, challenging, informing.

I've made friends, acquaintances, colleagues and comrades.

We've shared stories, swapped ideas - many of their collective ideas informed my address to the 150 who attended the rally.So to them all thanks.


Standing on a bench, surrounded by Barclays and Vodafone, here's what I had to say:
(please check against delivery - always wanted to say that!)

In 15 days time, the Tory- led Coalition introduced the size criteria that will see poor and vulnerable tenants in social housing facing a reduction in their Housing Benefit each and every week.

The Tory Fail Government supported by their Lib Dem allies in the Coalition seem to focus more on the fact that is not a tax.

They seem keen on discussing whether it’s called

the Size Criteria

the Under Occupancy Penalty,

or the Spare Bedroom Subsidy.

But to me and you it’s the BEDROOM TAX

It’s a phase the Tories don’t like – IDS realy hates us calling it the Bedroom Tax.

Well Mr Duncan Smith I can think of a way to stop us mentioning the Bedroom Tax

ABOLISH it

That’s the best course of action because it’s so ill-conceived. 

It’s a unfair and perverse tax which will hit hundreds of thousand of vulnerable people living in social housing around the country

It is a mass of contradictions and full of unintended consequences.

And it penalises tenants for a weak housing policy – of all recent Governments, including Labour – that has failed to build enough Social Homes.

But it's no surprise that theses plans are such a mess.

That's because its being organised by the Department of Work and Pensions

Yes the crack team that gave us a Work Programme that is officially worse than doing nothing.

And their reward is that they been given another brewery in which to organise a party.

When I started drafting this speech I had lots of examples about how incompetent these regulations were.

But during the week, Inane Duncan Smith made some changes – changes that are described as helping families with severely disabled children, foster carers and forces familes

But that’s not the real picture

Its only SOME families with severely disabled children...

only those that under Bedroom Tax rules would have to share with siblings..

there is no allowance for social need, such storing essential equipment to help them to cope with their disability

It’s only SOME foster carers

Only current foster carers or those approved in last 12 months will be protected from reduction in Housing benefit...

and only for ONE extra bedroom, meaning fosters  carers wanting to look after siblings and needing more than one extra bedroom will still be liable for Bedroom Tax

And, we're not sure on this one, but  it maybe SOME forces familes

there is still a lack of clarity on how the Bedroom Tax applies to 'teenage adults' in terms of forces families...

Many military personnel and forces families think exemption only applies when 'on operations' - ie frontline duty... in Afghanistna, Mali, etc.

No exemption if they in Catterick training to go 'on operations'

I say again the Bedroom Tax needs to be abolished

And it needs to be abolished wholesale, not piecemeal

Making concession after concession, hoping like in a game of Kerplunk the whole thing doesn’t collapse on you is NOT the answer

It needs to be abolished now

The coalition are trying to use the tactic of DIVIDE AND CONQUER – we must unite together to fight – not each other, but this evil Bedroom Tax

We need to stand together and reveal the truth.

That they are discriminating demonstrates the unfairness of their policy.

But they have a solution to some of the hardships that the inherent unfairness of the Bedroom Tax will bring.

Lib Dem and Tory MPs over the past few weeks have continually stood up from the Government benches in the House of Commons and told us that there is a Discretionary Housing Payment available to cover hardships

They seem to think that £25 million available will support all the 440,000 households with a disabled family member.

That somehow that £25 miilion in DHP could make up for the £300million that those hard-pressed 440,000 families will give up in Housing Benefit reductions

The truth is the DHP fund will barely cover 1 in 10 of such cases. So the DHP will probably be paid up to a maximum of 13 weeks

Just yesterday I read that a Tory MP in Central Bedforshire couldn’t believe how the Discretionary Housing Payment wouldn’t just make the problem of the Bedroom Tax completely disappear.

He said he did not think the policy of ‘just giving a short-term’ DHP is appropriate ‘because the situation could be exactly the same at the end of the period’.

‘Surely the people who have disabilities whose houses have been adapted specifically to help them live in them should be in a separate category.'

And that's from someone who should know how all this should work - Andrew Selous MP is Parliamentary Private Secretary to Iain Duncan Smith at DWP

Put like that, it is obvious that the bedroom tax is attacking the vulnerable, the poor, the sick, the terminally ill and the disabled.

A *discretionary* payment for something so fundamental & permanent as shelter is just a recipe for housing stress & insecurity

One of my acquaintances from Twitter - @WeshWallace - wrote an open letter to the Prime Minister

In it she said:

"David Cameron

"You say why should I have this lifestyle I cannot afford?

"Why should others pay for me to live like this?

"Since when has being made blind a life style choice?

"Since when was being made redundant an excuse for you to label me a skiver and a scrounger?

"Since when has claiming benefits means your not entitled to be treated as a human being?

"Since when has it become acceptable to treat me like a piece of rubbish?"

I want to speak up for those silent voices, the ones that the privileged members of the Cabinet never hear.

I want them to reflect on the words of  Mahatma Ghandi 

"A nation's greatness is measured by how it treats its weakest members."

This is what the  Government thinks ofthe poor in this country?

They are introducing the Bedroom Tax on the same day as it’s giving millionaires a tax break – giving them a saving of around £100,000.

So that's it 

 The vindictive mess that is the BedroomTax.  Rush it in. Kerplunk!

Millionaire's tax break? Of course that's OK. Kerching?

On the first of April – that really is a sick April Fool’s Day joke

Yesterday was Red Nose Day – perhaps we should rebrand April the first RED FACE DAY.

I want to see their embarassment. I want to see them squirm.

The Coalition claim that the bedroom tax is needed to reduce the housing benefit bill.

But the scheme is now so chaotic it could actually end up costing more than it saves in many parts of the country.

Just last week I spoke to one of my residents.

She is worried about the bedroom tax – worried sick

She has a 3 bedroom property but her 2 sons are in care.

And the judgement under Bedroom tax is that  2 of those bedrooms are spare, surplus to needs.

Those 2 bedrooms give her hope that one day her sons will return to live with her.

But if she doesn’t have those 2 rooms, her sons can never return to live with her.

At the moment her rent  for that 3 bedroom rent is £85 per week, meaning she'd have to find £23 per week to cover the reduction of Housing Benefit that is the Bedroom Tax.

She’s looked at downsizing.

She’s been lucky and found somewhere – a single bedroom apartment at £99.

How is that reducing the housing benefit bill? 

And that increase of £14 takes away her hope.

 And if we remover her hope – what will be the social cost?

This Government is being cynical in introducing this legislation –

they know the price of everything,

yet at the same time, they ignore the cost

I forsee increased demand on

The National Health Service

I forsee increased demand on

Sevices dealing with mental health and social wellbeing

I forsee increased demand

Homelessness services

All directly attributable to the devastating effects of the Bedroom Tax

If families are made homeless or pushed into expensive private rented accommodation the tax payer could actually be left with a higher bill – and still the problem of under occupancy will not be solved.

Ministers claim they are trying to solve under-occupancy but David Cameron and Iain Duncan Smith have been forced to admit that it is impossible for their plans to work because there aren’t enough smaller homes for families to move into.

So all the Bedroom Tax will achieve is making some of the poorest and most vulnerable people in society even poorer.

The best way to bring down the benefits bill is to get people into jobs

I’m not sure if you know this fact, but the majority of Housing Benefits claimants are in work and 93% of new claimants need this benefit to subsidize low paying employers and part-time work.

That’s why Ed Miliband is looking at ways to move forward with a Living Wage

That’s why Labour is looking at ways to stimulate growth and employment

Labour supports sensible reform to the Social Security system – but that’s not the same as these current WELFARE CUTS

The ones that are being pushed forward by this Tory Government supported by its Lib Dem allies

From the Guardian to The Sun, everyone is warning the government that this policy is a mess, but ministers are burying their heads in the sand.

They have to concede that the Bedroom Tax is crazy.

They have to concede that the Bedroom Tax is now in total disarray.

This isn’t about tough choices, it’s about the wrong choices.

Ministers must now admit they have got this horribly wrong and think again – before it’s too late.

Already Labour front-benchers Liam Byrne and Jack Dromey have confirmed that they will abolished the Bedroom Tax if Labour are returned to power.

I will want to hold them to that.

I am clear that the Bedroom Tax needs to be abolished.

I want it abolished now.

And if not now, I will press the Labour front bench team to abolish it as a matter of urgency if we are returned to power in 2015.

Thank you for listening and thank you for your support