Support striking NHS workers in Glasgow and Clyde
Text of a Socalist Party Scotland leaflet
Socialist Party Scotland gives our 100% solidarity to Unison ward clerks across the NHS Greater Glasgow and Clyde area who have begun a two-day strike over pay and grading.
Wednesday 5th August saw the Unison branch organise pickets of hundreds at Queen Elizabeth University Hospital, Glasgow Royal Infirmary, Inverclyde Royal and the Royal Alexandra in Paisley. Pickets rallied and sloshed at the board headquarters at Gartnaval later.
Support has come in from Unison and trade union branches nationally for one of the most high-profile NHS strikes in recent years. The enthusiasm for the strike reflects the anger that these workers, overwhelmingly women, are on the lowest NHS pay grade, even though they are being given greater and greater responsibilities and tasks.
The employer, Scotland’s largest health board, has been dragging out reviews of grading and pay for years, ever since the pandemic. They have kept pay low while ward clerks get more and more duties.
The Unison strike ballot saw a 98% vote in favour, showing the overwhelming willingness to fight.
This strike makes a mockery of NHS Glasgow and Clyde health board, and behind them the Scottish National Party (SNP) government’s supposed “partnership” relationship with the trade unions.
A year of negotiations took place, yet still NHS management and politicians stall on an evaluation and back pay. Before the picketing began, management were encouraging other staff to carry out ward clerk strikers’ duties.
According to Unison, “the board as of Tuesday morning had offered only one year of backpay, far short of resolutions for the District Nurse and Payroll Officers in dispute this year”. At the rally at Gartnaval, a Unison organiser reported the employer had just used negotiations on the eve of the strike to repeat an offer which had already been rejected.
As all who work in and use the NHS are aware, the service is in severe crisis because the health board and the SNP government want to get away with low pay in the NHS.
The workers’ action will impact acute services and appointments, the co-ordination of patient transport and admin like death certificates. Ward clerks also act as a key point of contact for patients, relatives and staff.
Already waiting times in areas like accident and emergency are at record-breaking levels. As UNISON NHS Glasgow Clyde & CVS Branch branch secretary Frances Carmichael said: “These skilled workers are essential to the running of hospitals. Without them, doctors and nurses would be dealing with paperwork rather than focusing on patient care”.
A Royal Alexandra picket speaking at the rally made the point, “during the pandemic we were promised that when things got back to normal, these roles would be taken off us and pay would be improved, but those promises have been broken”.
Support across the trade union movement must continue and widen for the ward clerk’s action. The strike will also lift the mood of workers across the NHS in Scotland and many will also want to organise a fight on pay and grading, with the continuing cost of living crisis.
It is possible more strike days and for a more sustained period will have to be called by Unison to win the dispute. There is a mood building among public sector workers to fight.
The trade unions have a responsibility to mobilise to force the Scottish government and the new prime minister Burnham, who has promised a “different course from austerity” to end attacks on pay. But Burnham has also made friendly promises to the bosses, and no one has forgotten his record of cuts and PFI in the NHS .
That’s why Socialist Party Scotland members are campaigning in the unions and pressuring the TUC/STUC to call and organise national demonstrations against austerity and for pro-worker policies.
Our members are demanding pay rises must rise to fully match inflation to protect workers from the cost of living crisis. All public sector unions must unite in a campaign on pay and, if needed, nationally coordinate strike action.
Fully fund NHS
The recent election victories for the left in the Unison and PCS trade unions also show a growing mood for a fight. The NHS is in crisis from decades of underfunding, and a lack of staffing. As are all other public services, including, councils, health and social care partnerships and education.
The SNP have for decades passed on austerity from the Tories and now Labour in Westminster. Workers and all those suffering austerity need a political alternative, especially as forces on the far right are attempting to turn workers against each other .
Through the Scottish Trade Unionist and Socialist Coalition, Socialist Party Scotland stood in the May elections on socialist, anti-cuts policies, including no cuts budgets to defend public services and demanding the mass public investment the NHS needs.
We are campaigning for a coordinated electoral socialist challenge in the 2027 council elections as a step towards building the new mass workers’ party based upon the trade unions that is needed.
Ultimately, we need a socialist society that could eliminate poverty, unemployment and oppression based on public ownership of the major companies, banks and industries under the democratic control and management of the working class.
