Letting down our soldiers?

Last night at the Ipswich Borough Council meeting, our Labour Group put forward a motion asking for the Government to consider scrapping the 1% pay cap on Public Service workers, Cllr Bryony Rudkin proposed the motion and it was seconded by Sandra Gage, both commented on how hard some public workers were finding it hard to get by with some nurses now having to rely on food banks.

Even members of the Tory Cabinet are now considering supporting the removal of the pay cap but currently the Chancellor is holding firm on his strict stance. The election result in June plus what their own residents are telling them has caused a number of Tory MPs to consider their own position on the wage cap. Philip Hammond, the Chancellor may not be happy with some of his MPs wavering but he would have been much more comfortable with the response of the Ipswich Tory Group.

Cllr Harsant stated she did understand the hardship that public service workers were bearing but she would still vote against the motion because she felt it was better for the country, I do not agree with her but she at least made a decent attempt at explaining her position, the same could not be said of the other Tories who spoke.

Many said that the current economic situation (all down to Gordon Brown, according to them) meant we could not afford a rise above 1% for anyone - none could explain how it was OK for some of them to vote for a much larger rise for the Tory leaders on the County council last week! Some of the other comments were far more outrageous - Cllr Carnall decided to focus on tuition fees and Corbyn (not sure what that had to do with the wage cap) but when he did speak on the motion he described the contributions by Cllrs Gage and Rudkin as 'sob stories'.

Many of their front bench seemed to enjoy informing us all that public service workers would not get a pay cut, Nadia Cenci stated she would like to give all soldier pay of £100,000 but still would not vote for the lifting of a 1% pay cap on our armed forces.

Cllr Phillips indicated that independent pay review boards settled public service pay - he was almost right, in the case of the Armed Services the Government just ignores the findings and pay review boards for other public service workers are often told that they can't recommend pay rises of over 1% before they start. So much for any form of independence.

As Bryony Rudkin later commented, the mask had slipped and the 'nasty party' was back with a bang. By this time, I had decided to speak not only because of the anger I now felt after listening to the Tories speak but also by the hypocrisy of some who stayed silent.

Robin Vickery is both a Borough and a County Councilor and has often spoken up for the Armed Services, no real surprise as he is a dedicated member of the British Legion and holds a senior post within the Suffolk British Legion. Earlier in the meeting he had asked a question about Suffolk Day where he had lamented the lack of floral displays at the recent event, his last comment had been that he had hoped their would be a better show when we remembered the battle of Passchendaele on Monday., not a surprising comment due to his role in the British Legion, but when it came to voting for a motion to ask the Tory Government to lift the 1% wage cap on our current soldiers, sailors and airmen he refused but only a week earlier he had voted for a 15% pay rise for Tory County leader, Colin Noble.

As a senior member of the British Legion I would have expected him not only to vote for but speak up for any motion that supported our current armed forces. I had earlier spoken to say that a 1% pay rise would not have stopped me from wanted to be a member of the army but this Tory Government is not just asking soldiers to take home just a 1% rise it is actually reducing their weekly pay packet as they look to introduce the 'Armed Forces Future Accommmodation Model' - a plan that is so flawed that serving senior officers are even going public in their criticism of the proposed scheme. This would mean that some young soldiers could actually see an 8-9% pay cut. But this did not seem to sway Cllr Vickery who still voted against the motion. Maybe now is the time that Cllr Vickery looked at his position within the Suffolk British Legion.

The next 5 weeks ahead - up till 5 May 2016

The next few weeks will be spent mainly in North East Ipswich campaigning hard for the local Labour Party - so there will be no  'My week ahead' posts till after election day. (Some of you may cheer!)

For some of us the end of the election will just signal a short pause before we start campaigning for a vote to remain in Europe.

So from Tuesday (most evenings) till May 5th, you will see us out campaigning, most of you know that we campaign all year round and you would have spoken to us on our Saturday door knocking sessions but in Rushmere Ward, we may see the 'Lesser Spotted Tory' - there has been only one unconfirmed sighting since last May! So much for Mr Gummer speaking to residents, not even sure he lives in Ipswich anymore.

Ipswich Borough Council, I believe have done a great job in protecting front line services, in the face of severe cuts by a Tory (and at first Tory/Lib Dem) Government but also with the added handicap of having a Tory County council who are also intent on privatising all their services. A Tory County council that currently has no Tory County Councillors, who appointed a Cabinet Member for Ipswich, who has yet to turn up to a single Ipswich Area Committee even though he was invited and the Tory Leader 'I want to be Mayor of East Anglia' Colin Noble asked for the dates to be sent to him again.

Fact is the Tories do not care about Ipswich and will not even attempt tp pretend they do until about 2019, when Mr Gummer will suddenly crawl back out of the woodwork, move back to the town and attempt to get the Wet Dock Crossing named after him!

At the last North East Ipswich Area Committee, the Tory Councillor for Bixley could not think of one good thing this Government or Tory County Council have done for this part of the town - he had to mention the Wet Dock Crossing as if it was great news for North East Ipswich residents - getting the Tory County Council to sort out the daily congestion in Argyle Street or get a new Primary School built in East Ipswich would have been far more useful!

My week ahead, 10 - 16 August 2015

Monday 10 August, 4pm – Meeting with Suffolk FA at Ransomes

Tuesday 11 August, 11am – Welcoming the World Rugby Cup to Ipswich, Cromwell Square 5pm – meeting with Deputy Leader candidate, Ben Bradshaw, Station Hotel

Thursday 13 August, 6pm – Area Committee Chairs meeting, Grafton House

Saturday 15 August, 10am – Labour Campaigning, North East Ipswich

A good week ahead for me a mix of politics and sport – with two big cycling events coming up over the next few weeks this week it is football and rugby taking centre stage.

On Monday I am attending a meeting with the Suffolk FA looking at our plans for Ransomes, work on the pavilion should start next month.

Some might have expected an apology from certain Ipswich Tories as they were always quick to go to print and tell anyone who would listen that we planned to build council houses on the site, but I never expected the ;likes of Judy Terry, Kevin Algar or Eddie Phillips to apologise.

We also have the Rugby World Cup coming to Ipswich on Tuesday, slightly more low profile than the Olympic Torch relay and the Commonwealth Baton event but I am sure Ipswich residents will make Tuesday a great day for all.

Also on Tuesday, we have another Deputy Labour Leader candidate coming to Ipswich to speak to members and supporters, it will give at least one Ipswich Tory activist another opportunity to put numerous lies in his blog. Last week for the visit of Angela Eagle he informed his readers how many Labour councillors attended the event and even used a photograph as evidence, trouble was there were more councillors in the photo that he counted!

Ipswich Tories were out in Rushmere Ward on Saturday, not that I or my neighbours received a leaflet but rumour has it Mr Gummer was asking for residents views on the town centre, thought it may be a bit late to ask as he has nailed his support to the Ipswich Central Plan – and rubbished the plans of the Borough Council - what now if residents do not agree with that Ipswich Central Plan?

Why do the Tories hate the young so much?

At the Ipswich Full Council meeting last week the Labour run council proposed to raise the pay of council employed apprentices. Recently we had become a living wage employer a fact we were proud of but by raising wages of all our staff so they earn at least the living wage it seemed right to also raise our apprentices pay.

The wage rise had been looked at in depth, supported by a (all party) council working group and the figures had been checked to make sure we could pay the rise from our budget.

Not sure anyone thought this would be contentious and all thought the proposal would fly through with all party support, but before we could vote we were suddenly handed out (a badly worded) Tory amendment.

We aimed to raise our apprentice pay from £2.73 to £3.82 in the first year and then from £5.13 to £7.18 in the second and in Year 3 from £6.50 to £7.85.

The badly Tory written amendment proposed a first year rise from £2.73 to £3.79 but unless you had the pay table in your hands could have been easily misconstrued to think there were no further rises in Yr 2 and 3 and actually a pay cut from existing pay rates.

But once you found table 2.11 you could see there were further wage increases in Year 2 and 3 but far below what Labour were proposing.

So why? Tory leader Cllr Cenci was concerned that the Borough would now have the best pick of all apprentices and that other firms would now be forced to increase their rates of pay, she informed us she understood this as her own partner, a local plumber employs apprentices – but I still could not detect any good reason from her for not paying the rise.

She had young Tory Councillor Eddie Phillips second her amendment and he spoke in support of it, he made a hash of it to say the least and seemed to imply that young Ipswich residents would be happy to get any job and would not be worried about the rate of pay.

Now Cllr Phillips is a Union rep at AXA, and I believe they employ apprentices, not sure those young apprentices will now be totally confident that Eddie Phillips is standing up for them as their union representative rather than supporting the employer!

So why do Ipswich Tories like their leaders in Westminster hate the young so much?? Maybe because unlike our senior residents, they don’t vote?

Comment:

Cllr Cenci is not happy with this post and has asked me to add her own comments to the post- which I am happy to do:

What I actually was stating is that I didn't understand why we had so many vacancies when I know that employers are inundated with requests for apprenticeships. In other words it's not money that is the reason for our vacancies in my opinion. I asked the question of how are we proactively seeking young people and are we partnering the job centre. No reply.
Just because some, like my husband, can afford to pay above minimum apprenticeship wages, doesn't mean all businesses can and my concern is that if we send out the message that this is the right thing, less apprenticeship positions will be available.