'We all deserve decent pay'
Public sector workers need a pay rise
Reading time: 3 min
Unite delegate Bridie McCreesh called for an overhaul of public sector pay in a powerful address on the last day of Labour conference (Wednesday, September 30).
“When are we going to fix public sector pay?” she asked. “Public-sector workers like me, have had enough of pay cuts and falling living standards. We know restoring that loss cannot happen overnight – but where is the plan?”
Speaking as a public sector worker herself, she hailed “public servants in every community”, including local authority workers, school support staff, social care workers, NHS workers, and police staff among others.
“We all deserve decent pay,” she said. “And when we get a pay rise, our money doesn’t go offshore! It goes into local shops, local communities and local businesses.”
Bridie said she welcomed the new School Support Staff Negotiating Body and the new Fair Pay Agreement for social care.
“But these new bodies must mean meaningful negotiation, backed by the funding to deliver,” she added. “The same is true for our existing agreements: underfunded and undermined.
“Across local government, employers plead poverty year after year, while bargaining is treated with contempt,” Bridie continued, adding that national agreements must be respected and enforced.
“I’m supremely proud of the more than 1,000 Unite craft workers who took strike action this summer to defend their national agreement,” she went on to say. “Leeds, Bristol, Mid Suffolk, Newham, Stoke and Southwark. Solidarity!”
Bridie also spoke of health workers, including “heroic” health visitors in Cwm Taf “forced to take action simply to secure the rate for the job”.
“And when are going to finally ditch the discredited Pay Review Body?
Health workers have spoken – we need direct negotiations for NHS pay!”
“Conference, rebuilding our public services requires more than warm words” Bridie concluded to applause. “It requires meaningful collective bargaining, properly funded agreements—and a plan to rebuild public-sector pay.”
The motion was carried.
By Hajera Blagg
Photo by Mark Thomas
