By Eric KIng-
Kirklees council threatens legal action against a social services union over their plans to strike next week.
The council has written to its local Unison branch to warn it would take “immediate steps” to secure a court injunction unless the union called off a one-day strike planned for 27 January.
A deadline of 4pm was set yesterday, but the union has taken no notice of the threat and plans to pursue to strike as planned.
Social workers at the council are striking over a series of issues including pay, case loads, IT systems and high dependency on agency staff. Social workers are known to be overburdened with immense work load, this many times leading to inefficiency and alarming blunders that has resulted in disciplinary action by the H.C.PC, who regulates them.
A ballot on industrial action was backed by 79% of 75 Unison members who voted for the strike. Social workers in many boroughs all over the country work really hard, but are not paid enough for the heavy work load they have to deal with. Their cry for higher pay should be granted or reasons why the demand is unreasonable should be stated by the council if they believe so. Threat of legal action is a cop out from addressing the disturbing issues of too much work versus too little pay. Social workers need far more support than is provided, including better levels of training, but insufficient pay in any field of work is always going to be a destabilizing rot that will affect the overall performance of those in the field.
Kirklees council must seriously consider raising their pay, and the government really should intervene in situations like these. Strikes over pay are becoming far too common in the U.K, with the NHS and the London underground being one of the habitual strikers for a few years now. Instead of turning against the strikers, their complaints ought to be closely examined and practical steps taken to improve the state of affairs. If Brexit weakens the economy by any proportion, does this means the present state of discontent will get worse? That will be unacceptable given the vital importance and necessity for continuity in certain professions.
Kirklees children’s services. has been dogged by an internal dispute for a while, with the heat going up with every passing day, week, and month.The council’s director of children’s services quit last week after less than nine months in post, intensifying the dispute. KIrklees children’s service has been under government intervention since being given an ‘inadequate’ Ofsted rating in November last year. Sadly, not much seems to have changed since then, but this strike is expected to pile the pressure up on council officials and the government. With just a week until the strike, it remains to be seen if it indeed gets dealt with before then, but it will be no surprise if nothing changes about this. Some representatives of the council told the eye of media.com that plans will be put in place to ”minimise disruption and ensure services run as close to usual as possible”. Trouble is that the usual standard of service is below recommended standards, hence one of the reasons for the strike