5 Comments

• Anonymous 5th Mar '08 - 11:49pm

  Having been an afficionado of Lib Dem tabloids, I must say that this one looks pretty poor. And what is with the extremely crude cutting out of Boris Johnson? His hair looks bizarre. Or was this the point?

• Martin Land 6th Mar '08 - 9:20am

  Content excellent; design bizarre!

• Stuart 6th Mar '08 - 9:21pm

  Anonymous – I don’t think that the LibDems are responsible for Boris having bad hair. That’s kind of his responsibility.

• Anonymous 6th Mar '08 - 11:25pm

  Stuart – no, it definitely looks like a very rough cutting out of Johnson from some other photo. Great tufts of his hair must have gone missing there! Even my £5 hairdresser on the Holloway Road couldn’t do that bad a job.

  It is rather like the awful photoshopped pictures of Bob Neill at the Bromley by-election, which made him look as if he was making a offensive childish face, and which weren’t very edifying. It only makes other parties think we are taking the p…

• Steve Norton 21st Apr '08 - 11:50am

  Steve Norton
  PCS Group Assistant Secretary
  Dept of Health Group
  Skipton House, Room 533B, 80 London Road
  London SE1 6LH

  21st April 2008

  Dear Brian

  We welcome your views on public services

  The Public and Commercial Services union (PCS) is asking Mayoral candidates standing in the GLA elections in London about their views on public services. PCS is the union for more than 85,000 members who live and work in the South East in the civil service, non-departmental public bodies, related areas and the private sector. There are around 600 members based mainly in the South London area who are participating in this campaign. The responses received will be distributed locally to members and posted on the PCS website prior to the election on 1 May to help them make up their minds when they cast their votes.

  This is a unique opportunity for you to comment on the current state of civil and public services and will give you an opportunity to get your message across to all our members in the Department of Health and more widely across PCS in the run up to the election.

  We would be delighted if you could respond to the following four questions:

  1. PCS is campaigning for fair pay for its members, meaning that their pay should increase in line with inflation and be negotiated nationally instead of 200 separate sets of negotiations. Do you support PCS’s campaign for fair pay for public servants?

  2. PCS has recently reached a national agreement to avoid unnecessary compulsory redundancies wherever possible. Although this was a major breakthrough, the threat of cuts in jobs over the longer term remains, which will impact on the work of this Department and others who provide a valuable service to the work of government and the public in their particular areas of expertise.
  Where do you stand on cutting civil and public service jobs?

  3. PCS is concerned that privatisation of the civil service has continued since 1997. Some areas of work previously performed by civil servants in the Department of Health has been transferred out to private organisations. We believe this is costly and unnecessary and jeopardises services being delivered on behalf of government and ultimately the public, some of whom are vulnerable members of society. Where do you stand on privatising public services?

  4. If re-elected as Mayor during your period of office what actions would you take to protect and promote public services in London?

  We request that you keep your answer to each question to less than 200 words and send us your responses by 21st April. Please send them to me at ([email protected]) or send to the above address. If you have any queries regarding this request please call me on (020 7972 2780).

  PCS members in DH as part of a national campaign are calling for –

  o An end to unfair pay
  o An end to privatisation without agreement
  o Adequate resources and decent working conditions
  o No cuts to the civil service compensation scheme
  o No compulsory redundancies

  I look forward to receiving your response.

  Yours sincerely

  Steve Norton