Bristol Trade Unions and the Public tell MP Minister what he can do about his cuts.

The trade unions and their members representing the Youth of today from Connexions and the LA Youth Service and the education of your children, Housing workers for affordable and social housing, Health workers who want a stable health service and concerned members of the public. All joined forces on Monday 26th July to let the Council and their visiting Minister for Local Government know in no uncertain terms, frontline services to the elderly, the vulnerable and children should not be touched to pay for the deficit this country faces at the hands of the bankers and the Financial sector whose greed allowed them to play russian roulette with our money. We were joined by local Labour Councillors who have come out in Condemming the cuts imposed by the ConDem Coalition Government. Bristol City is lead by a Liberal Democrat administration, we look forward to having them back us, the workforce of frontline services and the public who receive them, and we are waiting to hear them ConDem the cuts as well.

We are in this together the working person who is being hit the hardest for the mistakes and greed of the rich. I am proud to be a voice of the millions who will be vulnerable and hurt by the ConDem proposals.

Bristol City Council plans to raise charges for care services hitting the most vulnerable and take away the subsidy for Meals on Wheels leaving thousands in worse state of poverty and potential ill-health because they cannot afford a nutritional well balanced meal in their old age.

Bristol's population and businesses rely heavily on the 66,600 public sector jobs across the city and we will all pay a price to high for thousands of out of work crucial frontline service staff who will just add to the misery of this city and potentially create a double dip recession for Bristol. Something no one will benefit from and cause even more hardship across the board.

The latest ill-thought through scheme of the ConDem coalition is to create a National Citizen Service for 16+ and a boot camp in the summer. What parents want for their children is a good job when they leave school, not a life of cheap labour doing 'community work' to make the privileged few a lot richer on the backs of those who deserve a better start in life our children.

Jackie

How Care is provided, something to think about

An interesting article in Community Care this morning describing many different alternatives on how care services could be delivered in ways we may not have thought about.

The article talks broadly see here about privatising generally, social enterprises or local authority trading company. All designed to reduce costs of hourly rates like homecare.

This on the surface appears like a wonderful idea, but in my own local authority the management of care services were tasked with just that job in 2006 and we are still waiting for them to do something. Care costs remain as high as ever, so maybe we should be thinking that management who can't deliver on their job descriptions are the problems that need to be removed ansd certainly before any creative alternatives are tried, otherwise whats changed. The care workers themselves are fed up of being a experiment for managements inadequate plans and poorly executed strategies.

We need visionary managers that can achieve these kind of results no matter who provides the services.

Jackie

Our NHS is being destroyed.

Many moan about the Labour Government but they had a massive job re-investing in the NHS after a decade of Tory under-investment.

Many don't wait long for emergency operations and hip n knee replacements have been common place. Please see the link below to see what the ConDems have planned.

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/7908742/Axe-falls-on-NHS-services.html

The health, well-being of our nation is severely under attack.

Please join us Monday 26th July 3.30pm on Castle Green Bristol to protest about this and an endless list of attacks on our way of life. Jobs will be scarce so they've created the National Citizen Service for a generation of young people who won't find work, so cheap labour doing community work your legacy, homecare and Meals on wheels charges set to increase. VAT will affect everyone. Child benefit frozen, working conditions and pensions under attack, Family credit withdrawn for thousands and many more to follow. Older people being asked to leave their family Council accommodation.

Please join us tomorrow to let your feelings be known, we will not take these cuts from our front line services. The Tories via Cameron promised in his last election leadership debate he would not hurt the young, the vulnerable or the elderly. Everything they've decided since has gone back on that pledge. He didn't win Downing Street and he wasn't elected out right, so let's tell him to go.

Jackie
Sent by Jackie using BlackBerry® from Orange

The Big Society to me

A poem from the new statesman.

I am the Big Society
As vacuous as ash,
A dose of petty piety
While we are strapped for cash:
My voice is made of mimicry,
My muscles of veneer,
My lips of wholesale gimmickry.
My substance? No idea.

I call myself Philanthropy:
You'll gather round me, shall you?
But I'm the great misanthrope
And I possess no value.
I am a slogan, brief, inane,
Coined by someone keen,
But utterly without a brain.
I don't know what I mean.

Suppose you wish to start a school,
Or hospital, or vet's,
The Big Society says Cool -
Bring pupils, patients, pets,
And organise the whole bang shoot.
We think you'll find it cheaper.
The Bible has some words to suit:
Am I my brother's keeper?

The Big Society contains
A most expressive void,
Yet runs the blood-cells through the veins
Of all the unemployed.
It's visible as wi-fi
And not of bricks or mortar:
It's like the Big Chief I-Spy
And his Wigwam-By-The-Water.

Yes, I'm the Big Society,
A feeble, forceless fable
With no vim or variety
But one great trestle table:
You put it up, you celebrate,
You roast a local pig,
But find Society, too late,
Is anything but Big.
Sent by Jackie using BlackBerry® from Orange