Instead, all we got from the Minister were meaningless excuses. He would “like” to do something but it was the responsibility of other departments; the money wasn’t there; and incredibly creating jobs for young people would annoy big business because “they would have more competition”.
The only co-operation between departments has been on how to cut public sector jobs. Plenty of money has been found to bail out rich bankers and line the pockets of politicians.
It was obvious by the end of our meeting that our ideas fell on deaf ears. This is why Youth Fight for Jobs will take our message to the thousands of young people on the dole and stuck in low paid jobs as well as those in schools, techs and universities who will bear the brunt of the failure of the politicians, to organise and fight for the right to a decent job.
CWU telecoms conference reflected the anger of members in the industry. Motions calling for changes to the attendance agreements that have been used to invoke the use of compulsory overtime were carried. Motions calling for pension increases to be linked to RPI and for changes to the 'parking at home' agreements, which are being used to force members to work extra hours, were also carried.
There was an emphatic response to the savagery of the Con Dem spending cuts on Saturday in Edinburgh. Just 3 days after the government’s spending review that had proposed cuts of £81 billion in public spending, well over 20,000 people took to the streets for the Scottish TUC demonstration.