Unions set for confrontation with Blair
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Your support makes all the difference.Tony Blair is facing a bruising confrontation with Britain's biggest unions at their annual conference over the use of private companies to deliver public services and cut NHS waiting lists.
The Prime Minister, who is due to address the Trades Union Congress in September, will face demands to scrap the controversial private finance schemes used to build hospitals and schools, and to abandon the policy of using private health firms to treat NHS patients.
A series of congress motions published yesterday express frustration with the "privatisation of public services". Other motions attack poor wages for public-sector workers and accuse the Government of creating a "two-tier workforce" where staff employed by private companies earn less than public-sector colleagues doing the same job.
Unison attacks the Government's use of City auditors such as Andersen as consultants on private finance initiative (PFI) projects. A motion calls on the TUC to "investigate the 'big four' accountancy firms and their conflicting role through advising both public authorities and private companies".
The GMB says the Government's "privatisation programme has led to the demise of quality public services".
It calls for better laws to protect the pay, pension rights and employment conditions of public-sector workers and more cash for nurses, teachers and other public staff to help "attract, motivate and retain" them. Its motion "insists that privatisation is an ineffective way to reform or expand Britain's public services".
The union calls for a stop to PFI projects, which it says are "riddled with pseudo-scientific mumbo-jumbo designed to ensure that projects always appear to offer value for money".
The congress will also debate motions about the falling value of occupational pensions and will call for new laws to guarantee that unions are consulted in advance by companies planning important decisions such as the closure of a factory.
Last year, Mr Blair avoided a showdown with the unions when his scheduled appearance was cancelled because of the 11 September attacks. This year he will face a rebellious conference, which will put further strain on Labour's stormy relationship with the unions. The conference follows months of industrial unrest and the ousting of Mr Blair's closest union ally, Sir Ken Jackson, who was head of Amicus.
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