I’m on leave at moment and “out and about”, but managed to find out that rumours about Michael Gavan's suspension by his employer, Newham Council is true. Now, to be honest Michael and I don’t see “eye to eye” over some things (e.g. Respect), but he is a democratically elected trade union official with a very good reputation as an able rep when defending his members in discipline or sickness hearings.
From the information available to me, it seems that the allegations against him are also frankly rubbish.
This quote is from Newham UNISON via “Union Futures” Irene Stacey, Newham Unison branch secretary, “Michael is an honest and hard working branch chair and would never do anything that is not in our members' interests,” This is not the first time that the council have attacked our union and it is no coincidence that Michael has been suspended. It comes shortly after the union started a campaign against the privatisation of the refuse and cleansing service and Sir Robin Wales publicly declared that Unison stood in the way of his plans to cut pay and increase working hours for our members. The terms of the suspension are outrageous and underline the nature of the attack on the union.
Michael is a well respected representative and now he is banned from assisting anyone who faces sickness or disciplinary charges. It is clear that the council intend the suspension to drag on for as long as possible – no investigation officer has been appointed and no date for the investigation meetings has been set.
We expect the full support of our national union in fighting this attack on our union branch organisation. We will be asking for a ballot for strike action.
We will be asking for you full support in fighting for the reinstatement of our branch chair because if the council get away with picking and choosing who represents our members, then the council will feel confident to smash through wages, terms and conditions and push through more and more redundancies.”
Irene is a UNISON NEC and National Labour Link Committee member.
Together with other West Ham Labour Party GC delegates we have contacted the Labour group leadership and others on this matter and the related (I believe) issue regarding the current “single status” dispute.
Send messages of support to Newham UNISON
2 comments:
Thanks for the Hat tip again :)
I remember Michael from when I worked in Newham, he's been around for years and was a well respected rep when I knew him.
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