For the last few months, a team from the PCS NEC have been working with the DVLA Swansea branch to enable them to resolve a serious health and safety dispute that has arisen during the course of the pandemic.

Despite initially taking a sensible approach during the first lockdown and ensuring that the bare minimum of workers remained on site, by the middle of 2020, DVLA management had bought into Boris Johnson’s mantra that everything would soon be back to normal and they started a rapid escalation of returning staff to being physically on site.

After 48 years the Shrewsbury pickets who had been accused of unlawful assembly and conspiracy to intimidate have finally seen justice when their prosecutions were thrown out by the high court.

This is a huge victory for our entire movement and should be celebrated as such.

We in the PCS were proud to give our full support and solidarity to the campaign. Ricky Tomlinson addressed PCS Left Unity conference and DWP Group Conference during the campaign, and at both meetings members expressed full solidarity.

At a time when it is again under threat we must always defend workers’ rights to picket and protest.

Fran Heathcote

Between Monday 15th and Sunday 21st March, it is Neurodiversity Week. Neurodiversity includes a number of conditions such as Autism, Asperger Syndrome, Dyspraxia, Dyslexia, Attention Deficit Disorder, Obsessive Compulsive Disorder and Tourette’s Syndrome.

Many of these conditions were never recognised until long after the Disability Discrimination Act became law. There were no Reasonable Adjustments at work to accommodate these conditions. However, Reasonable Adjustments are not enough to ensure the well being of Neurodivergent employees. It is important that society has a more basic understanding of such needs.

On 16th March the Conservative Government’s Police, Crime, Sentencing and Courts Bill passed its second reading, bringing closer one of the biggest attacks on democracy, and under represented communities, in the UK in recent memory.

If passed into law, the Bill will immediately place a target on Gypsy, Roma and Traveller communities with the police able to seize individuals property and vehicles, while also levying fines and the potential threat of prison.

In addition the Bill also places severe restrictions on our human right to protest, notably by enhancing the ability of police to place restrictions on public processions while at the same time leaving what such restrictions may be entirely open.

On Tuesday 17^th March 2020 Birmingham ISS cleaners were due to strike and we had planned a strike rally with Fran Heathcote, the Midlands TUC secretary, a councillor and a Bootle striker. We also had a meeting planned for the evening. We had been organising for the events and were looking forward to them, but we were aware that the pandemic was looming.

Fran rang me the Friday before the event to tell me that she would not be able to come as the union had decided to suspend all travel and all meetings in response to the growing threat of Coronavirus.

That was a year ago.

The branch nomination process for the national and group elections closed last week and the nomination list for the NEC has now been published.

Left Unity would like to thank all those branches that supported and nominated the Democracy Alliance candidates. In a year like no other, the number of nominations our candidates received compares well next to our political opponents and when viewed against the last couple of years. This shows the majority of branches still recognise the important work done by the Left Unity leadership of our union.

Fran Heathcote received 70 branch nominations for President, over half the total nominations, and this pattern was repeated across the NEC nominations.

There is still much work to do, of course, and no one should be complacent going into the elections themselves. PCS Left Unity have led from the front during a challenging twelve months and the work our activists have done at all levels of the union is recognised in the published list of nominations.

Thank you once again, but please do all you can to ensure the Democracy Alliance slate receives that same level of support when the elections get under way next month.