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The 30 November strike was a brilliant show of strength and solidarity by over two million public sector trade unionists determined to challenge the government’s attack on our pensions.

Many of those trade unionists are now shocked and deeply unhappy to hear that the TUC and leaders of some unions such as Unison may be prepared to agree to a deal that falls far short of what is needed on all the main points.

The government’s new deal includes no extra money. They still want public sector workers such as social workers and social care staff to work longer, pay more for their pensions and get less when they retire. It still means a 50% rise in contributions, a retirement age of 68 for those now aged 34 or under, and a cut for all current pensioners as payments are indexed to the CPI instead of RPI inflation measure.

A series of meetings around the country and a conference in London will bring together activists from trade unions including Unison to discuss how to ensure that the new offer is rejected – and how to organise further action to defend our pensions in 2012.

The 30 November strikes showed we have the power to force the government back – let’s use it to win a decent deal on pensions.

The Unite the Resistance campaign is organising the following events:

Lobby the TUC: 2pm, Thursday 12 January, Congress House, Great Russell Street, London WC1B 3LS

Unite the Resistance emergency national meeting, 12 noon to 4pm, Saturday 14 January, Friends Meeting House, Euston Road, central London. Speakers include Mark Serwotka (PCS), John McDonnell MP

More info: http://uniteresist.org/2011/12/emergency-action-on-pensions-lobby-of-tuc-and-national-utr-meeting/

Alongside reports that the government could be planning to cut the 2012-13 social work education grant by 18%, it emerged in December that the University of Southampton has launched a consultation on plans to close its remaining social work programmes. The wider context of this is the drive to turn higher education into a full market through massive cuts in state funding and increased tuition fees. In response higher education institutions are likely to withdraw from more expensive programmes to run such as social work and concentrate on cheaper but more profitable courses regardless of the social value and contribution of courses like social work.

A blog has been set up with information about the proposed closure: http://swsresponse.wordpress.com/2012/01/03/closure-proposal/. SWAN urges our supporters to send their messages of opposition to the University of Southampton’s Vice-Chancellor – the email address is vc@soton.ac.uk.

A report from The Guardian newspaper is also available here: http://www.guardian.co.uk/healthcare-network/2012/jan/06/southampton-university-social-work-studies

SWAN will share further information as it becomes available.

Overwhelmingly the report, ‘Responsible Reform’, finds that disabled people do not agree that there is a need for an entirely new benefit (Personal Independence Payments or PIP) –  only 7% of the respondents to the consultation supported the change to PIP fully. It also challenges the Government’s claim that DLA receipt stops sick or disabled people from working.

The report finds the Government’s response to the DLA consultation highly misleading throughout and suggests that it is likely to have broken human rights legislation. Over 450 responses, detailing objections to the proposed changes, were submitted during the consultation period – yet the government did not publish the submissions and went ahead with its plans regardless.

Alongside the publication of the report, disability activists have been running a social media campaign using the twitter hashtag #spartacusreport, in order to promote and spread the challenge to the Government’s welfare reform and accompanying bill. SWAN ( @swansocialwork ) is supporting this campaign.

SWAN would like to draw the attention of all social workers, social care workers, service users, carers, educators and students to the publication of this report. You can download the full #spartacusreport or ‘Responsible Reform’ report here.

Representatives of Mad Pride, Defend Welfare Network, Boycott Workfare, Winvisible, Islington Disabled People Against Cuts, Black Triangle Campaign and Kilburn Unemployed Workers Group turned out to protest against Atos’ Work Capability Assessments (WCAs) for Employment and Support Allowance.

Some attendees dressed in Victorian garb to represent a comparison of the social policy which Atos are helping to manifest with that of Victorian times. It was a small but noisy demonstration and gave Atos the warning that we will all be back in the New Year.

Atos is being paid £100m a year to carry out the work capability assessments (WCAs), allowing the government to phase out incapacity benefit and replace it with the employment and support allowance (ESA).

The discredited WCAs themselves, the software which ‘assists’ the assessments (which misses nuanced and fluctuating conditions) and the centres in which these assessments occur (some of which are not wheelchair accessible), demonstrate Atos’ values and the real reason why they have been awarded this lucrative government contract: to meet sharp government quotas for reducing the number of people claiming Employment and Support allowance, rather than to assess and meet need. These assessments have led to tens of thousands of sick and disabled people being forced into poverty after being stripped of essential benefits. A number of suicides have been reported in the wake of WCAs.

To add grievous insult to injury, Atos are sponsoring the Paralympic Games (!) and Atos’ form of testing is soon to be extended to disabled and sick people claiming Disability Living Allowance.

Dan spoke on behalf of SWAN London at the demonstration and said he was proud to represent social workers who are appalled by the current assessment process and oppose it.

Pictures follow below of SWAN London members and others. Research on Atos’ Work Capability Assessments can be found here.

Manchester SWAN sent a small delegation of social work students from Uni of Manchester, Man Met and Salford to visit the picket line at Gorton Social Services. We showed solidarity with a small collection and card in support of the social services staff, from UNISON, GMB and UNITE, who had chosen to strike to defend pensions.

The picket line was fantastic, with workers from different social work offices passionately picketing what was being used as a scab centre for the city. Cars tooted their horns in support and we collected details of more people who want to fightback against the cuts and come to future SWAN meetings.

Many of us were also involved in the huge 20,000 demo in Manchester later on in the day, and were inspired by the volume of support by the people clapping and cheering the march, and the carnival-like atmosphere, as workers showed their power and shut down the city!

In order to look after the children in our service both now and in the future, we need social care workers who not be worn out or exhausted and with a carrot of a reasonable pension at the end of our working life. By taking this action now and protecting the value our pension, we are thinking of generations of children in the future.

Simon Cardy (West Midlands SWAN)

N30 Unison block on West Midlands march
The Bluebell Centre at Chelmsley Wood proved a particular challenge as the Council Offices lie within a privately owned shopping complex. Strikers gathered at different points around the perimeter of the centre, there were on going boundary disputes with the security staff over where they could stand. A lot of shoppers going into Asda’s expressed their support for the strikers.

Jensen House, a base for a number of Social Work teams, and Jubilee House were closed and picket lines formed opposite each other across Auckland Drive. Children’s Social Work Teams were solid in their support of the strike, and were run with emergency cover. Managers led their Teams out and joined the picket lines

The strike was well supported by Adult social care workers, all the Day Centre’s were closed and many residential workers and mental health workers were out. Just 12 of Solihull’s 76 schools were fully open.

Cllr David Jameison, leader of the Labour group on Solihull Council visited the picket line outside Solihull Council House and expressed the support of the Labour Group for our struggle to protect the livelihoods of low paid workers.

By mid morning UNISON members ended their picket duties to join the 15,000 demonstration in Birmingham City Centre.

Jolyon Jones (West Midlands SWAN)