Tag: GMB Union

Opposing views on a rate rise for Cambridgeshire

We have the asset portfolio in my opinion to become self-sufficient a couple of years down the line.

08:20 Thursday 28th January 2016
BBC Radio Cambridgshire

DOTTY MCLEOD: Let’s return to the subject of council tax. Would you pay more of it if it meant social care services in the county faced fewer cuts? Would you be happy to pay a little bit more each year? In last year’s Autumn Statement, the Chancellor George Osborne announced plans to let councils increase council tax by 2% if they spent that money on social care. This in the face of continuing cuts that threaten social care services. Richard O’Leary is from the GMB union. I spoke to him earlier. He says there’s only one option.
RICHARD O’LEARY: It’s a very complex question. I think our general view is they have no option but to implement this, and that’s because as you’ve already said earlier in your report, local government has been affected more than any area of the public sector with the cuts since 2010. If you take the national figure, local authorities have lost 51% of their budget in those six years, and Cambridgeshire is one of the hardest affected authorities in the country.
DOTTY MCLEOD: Cambridgeshire County Council at the moment will be advising the Government that they are ‘not minded’ to increase council tax by 2% for this purpose. A final decision will be made next month. Just to put it in context, for the average Band D property, a 2% rise on council tax would mean an extra £33 a year. With me now are two men with very different views on this. Ashley Walsh who is the Leader of the Labour group on Cambridgeshire County Council, who is calling for a rise bigger than 2%. Morning Ashley.
ASHLEY WALSH: Morning Dotty.
DOTTY MCLEOD: And also Paul Bullen who is the Leader of the UKIP group who thinks there should be no rise at all. Morning Paul.
PAUL BULLEN: Good morning Dotty.
DOTTY MCLEOD: So Ashley we’ll start with yourself. You’re calling for a 4% rise, an extra £60 on a year for the average householder. Why? Why do we need the money?
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Outsourcing of Cambridgeshire elder care – transfer is just a fortnight away

07:07 Friday 20th March 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

CHRIS MANN: Here’s our lead story this morning. Concerns raised about a ground-breaking Cambridgeshire NHS health contract. It’s due to take effect in two weeks time. It’s worth £800 million, and is the biggest single outsourcing of an NHS service in its history. On 1st April the contract to look after older people across the county will be managed and maintained by a brand new company called UnitingCare. It’s made up of a consortium between Addenbrooke’s Hospital and the CPFT. In a moment we’ll be talking to two people who’ve raised concerns about the changes, but first here’s part of a video, produced by United Care that’s been posted on their website, which explains what they do.
(AUDIO)
(MALE VOICE 1) We’re looking after an increasingly aging population with more complex diseases, more co-morbities. Now what we want to do is provide really joined up care for them.
(MALE VOICE 2) Care of older people is often badly affected by the fact that several organisations are trying to be involved, and that people fall between the cracks in the service, and often end up with care of the last resort in hospital.
(FEMALE VOICE 1) Working within an integrated partnership will allow us to provide consistency across Cambridgeshire and Peterborough, and that service will be available to everybody across that area, which is important.
(LIVE)
CHRIS MANN: So glossy video, very slick website, but is it all really as good as that, and how is the changeover going to happen? Concerns raised first of all by Steve Sweeney, who’s Regional Officer of the GMB Union. Hello Steve.
STEVE SWEENEY: Good morning.
CHRIS MANN: And thousands of your members will be involved in this.
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Steve Sweeney – the future of Hinchingbrooke Hospital

08:10 Wednesday 4th March 2015
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

DOTTY MCLEOD: The Director of Nursing and Midwifery at Hinchingbrooke Hospital says their priority is their patients, and they want to become a top rated Hospital. Deidre Fowler spoke at a meeting of Huntingdonshire District Council’s Overview and Scrutiny panel last night. Councillors and members of the public gathered to hear about the future of the Hospital . The private company who run it you’ll remember, Circle, are pulling out of their contract. Sarah Varey our reporter went to the meeting.
(TAPE)
SARAH VAREY: A committee meeting like any other in the Civic Suite at Pathfinder House, except the twenty or so seats in the public gallery were almost full of people hoping to find out just what the future holds for the Hospital .
PUBLIC ONE: I’ve got a copy of the Care Quality Commission report (342k pdf). I’m just interested to see what the Chief Executive is proposing for the future. But from where I sit, he shouldn’t be there to propose anything for the future, because they’ve already failed. I’m very interested in the future. I’m actually passionate about it.
SARAH VAREY: As a patient?
PUBLIC ONE: Both as a patient and as a member of the public. I’ve been one probably of their most frequent fliers over the last six years, both as an in-patient and an out-patient. And I think the wonderful staff there are being constantly let down by poor inefficient management.
SARAH VAREY: There was a growing air of anticipation as Item 4 on the agenda was reached, a presentation by Circle CEO Hisham Abdel-Rahman. It came in the form of a multi-coloured Powerpoint presentation, using pie-charts and graphs to represent the causes behind the Care Quality Commission’s highly critical report. A selection of pre-sub,itted questions from members of the public were then put to Dr Abdel-Rahman and three members of the executive board and the Trust board alongside him.. They covered mostly old ground. When did Circle realise the financial situation was deteriorating? What were the contributing factors? Questions from the Scrutiny Panel followed, with a heartfelt plea from one who’s a nurse at the Hospital , asking why no-one told the staff that all was far from well. There followed more coloured graphics headed ‘A realistic view of an improvement journey.’ and delivered by the Director of Nursing Midwifery and Quality, Deidre Fowler. She emphasised the number one priority, to put the patients first, and affirmed their ambition to become a top-rated Hospital , adding ‘we’re downtrodden but not beaten’. Amanda Buckenham from the We Love Hinhingbrooke Hospital group sais she’s looking on the bright side.
AMANDA BUCKENHAM: I take away from it the positive elements, the things that are going well, the fact that they’re not complacent. They do recognise that the improvements need to be made, whilst obviously not accepting as quite a lot of us don’t the overall judgment of the Hospital as being inadequate.
(LIVE)
DOTTY MCLEOD: Sarah varey reporting there from that meeting last night at Huntingdonshire District Council. Steve Sweeney was there. Steve is the GMB’s regional Organiser. Steve, this was an opportunity really for people in Huntingdon to talk to the Hospital bosses, to get some answers. Was it effective?
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TPA Swipe At Council Chiefs

07:07 Friday 4th October 2013
BBC Radio Cambridgeshire

[P]AUL STAINTON: Let’s start though with cuts to council budgets, which will impact on all of us, and in particular on front line services going forward. That’s the warning anyway from a union spokesman for Cambridgeshire. Officials from the GMB Union meet today to decide their response to further budget cuts local authorities are going to have to make over the next few years, as their central government grants are reduced yet again. Here’s Richard O’Leary, the GMB’s Regional Officer for Public Services in Cambridgeshire. Earlier he said there are no more efficiencies savings that can be made .
(TAPE)
RICHARD O’LEARY: Since 2010 the cuts in local government have been absolutely savage. By 2015 there’ll be over 500 jobs lost at the current figures in Cambridgeshire. And a billion pound budget will virtually have been cut in half. There literally is no more cuts to make, and the biggest effect in these cuts as well as on local residents are on the staff.
(LIVE)
PAUL STAINTON: As I mentioned, Cambridgeshire County Council has to save £159 million over the next five years. They’ve already made 500 people redundant in the last three and a half years, and the Leader of the Council Martin Curtis has warned that hundreds more jobs might have to go. And he says it’s not really his or the authority’s fault.
(TAPE)
MARTIN CURTIS: We have done everything Government asked of us. We’re the fastest growing county in the country. As successive governments have said that they want councils to invest in growth, we’ve done that, and what we feel is we’re being punished. The level of cuts we’ve got to make in the next couple of years, we’re one of the worst affected county councils. And what we’re saying is actually Government need to revisit this. They actually need to revisit the whole scope of funding cuts to councils in general, and think about whether they can find those savings elsewhere.
(LIVE)
PAUL STAINTON: So last week it was firefighters. earlier this week it was teachers. Could it be council staff who are the next group of public sector workers to go on strike? Well Richard O’Leary from the GMB didn’t rule it out.
(TAPE)
RICHARD O’LEARY: It’s difficult to say. We hope not. Strikes are always a last resort. I was talking to somebody yesterday and made the point that I think there’s only actually been four days of industrial action in public services in the last 25 years. That’s the purpose of our meeting in London today, to gauge the views of our local government reps, to see what can be done to work with local authorities. But also obviously our primary role is to protect members’ terms and conditions, and services to the public.
(LIVE)
PAUL STAINTON: Joining me now is Eleanor McGrath from the Taxpayers Alliance. They think councils could still make savings. Eleanor, where?
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