Councils merge services

9 February 2011

GMB FEARS FOR JOB LOSSES AND SERVICES AS WESTMINSTER, HAMMERSMITH & FULHAM, AND KENSINGTON & CHELSEA COUNCILS ANNOUNCE MERGER OF SERVICES

There is a real fear that frontline services will be hit and this will have a detrimental effect on residents and on jobs says GMB

GMB today commented on the announcement that Westminster, Hammersmith & Fulham, and Kensington & Chelsea councils are to merge certain services.

Gary Carter, GMB Organiser said, “GMB remains to be convinced that plans by Westminster, Hammersmith & Fulham, and Kensington & Chelsea will not impact on frontline services. Days before Christmas the Royal Borough of Kensington & Chelsea announced that 165 jobs are at the risk of redundancy and launched 36 reviews across departments. The jobs at risk include Technical, Clerical Professional, grant funded and 14 Managerial roles. This came shortly after 30 plus directly employed community care workers were offered voluntary redundancy, so the council could outsource their jobs to agencies.

GMB has written to the chief executive about the failure to properly consult with employee representatives and the manner and speed at which the council is looking to cut jobs.

The councils have provided a long list of services they are looking at, but in areas like street cleansing and refuse collection the three councils are locked into long term contracts with three different contractors, offering very different services. How will the interests of local residents in each borough be protected? Are we going to see cuts to refuse collection and street cleansing in each borough?

What the councils are saying does not reflect what is actually happening on the ground. There is a real fear that frontline services will be hit and this will have a detrimental effect on residents and on jobs. It should not be forgotten that the people providing these services, will lose their livelihoods at a time of rising unemployment and higher living costs.”

---

Press releases, papers and documents published on this page are the intellectual property of an organisation unrelated to ePolitix.com. We promote their parliamentary and political campaigning activities as they are subscribers to the ePolitix.com service.

As such, ePolitix.com does not edit, endorse, or attempt to balance the opinions expressed on this page. The content of press releases and other such types of content are the responsibility of the originating organisation.