| UNISON City of Edinburgh Branch |
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Branch gears up for action against £10million in cuts As this issue goes to print, we are in the run up to an Emergency Branch Meeting called to tackle the problems of at least £10m in spending cuts in the City of Edinburgh Council. The unions were not advised of the cuts plan and it was only following contact from members that our investigations unearthed this major issue. Since then there have been meetings with the council's top managers with more to follow. UNISON made a submission to the Council Meeting asking that the matter be continued to allow full and proper dialogue with UNISON, other council unions and appropriate stakeholders. "This justifiable request was refused by an alliance of the Liberal Democrat Group, the SNP Group and the Conservatives", said George Lee, Branch Secretary. The decision to put these financial measures in place will impact on all departments with non statutory services being removed and staffing cuts being implemented. Redundancy risk "At this time we have been given no commitment that the cuts can be achieved without compulsory redundancies. It is however clear that, at the minimum, we can expect a recruitment freeze", added George. The next Council meeting scheduled for Thursday 23 August 2007 will be considering further detail on these budget reductions and early indications are that the Council will look for even more cuts to allow financial reserves to be built up. "This is a situation which impacts on all of us and as a branch we need to decide a cohesive and strategic approach to the threats and attacks to our jobs and the services which we proudly provide for the public", said George. The Branch Meeting is likely to be asked to sanction a lobby, futher campaigning and possibly industrial action. |
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