SSHA are delighted to announce that our website has successfully passed the NHS Quality Assurance checklist. This means that a link to our site may be included in the relevant sections of www.nhsinform.co.uk, and may also be utilised by NHS 24’s Health Information Advisors when referring the public to further sources of information over the phone.

Tomorrow, if you work in the public sector, you may be on strike. Or, if you don’t work in the sector, you will know somebody close to you who has decided to take industrial action.

If you are taking action to defend your pension that day, we want to know. Tell Unite about it – then we can tell the world. Send us a text from your workplace, picket line or town centre. Let us know about the atmosphere, the turnout, even the weather. tell us what is going on. Or if your not on strike, send a message of support.

Following this vote, Unite is calling on all members employed by an employer where we have secured a YES vote and notified the employer of our intention to take strike action, to join with colleagues from other public sector trade unions in sending a very clear message in support of your pensions on November 30th, 2011.

The government is currently consulting on the contribution increases to the NHS Pension Scheme in England Wales and Scotland. We do not believe these increases are justified or necessary and this money will go straight to the treasury to repay the national deficit. We need you to respond to the consultations now. Consultation for England and Wales ends on 21st October and for Scotland on the 17th November.

Please note that the subscription rates to SSHA/Unite were increased from 1st September 2011.If you pay by direct debit the change will have been automatic. If you pay by check-off (via your payroll) you will need to advise your employer. If you pay by cheque, please ensure that you do not lapse your membership. Please note that, as ever, your PLI cover is included in the subscriptions.

The government is bringing forward a series of proposals which threaten to greatly reduce the pension benefits and increase their cost to members working in the public services. Unite has tried to negotiate a fair settlement with government but they refuse to hear workers’ concerns.

In this year’s review attention was placed on the impact of the proposed changes to the NHS in England on matters of patient safety and professional conduct which will require a regulatory response. Recommendations are made to the regulators and to the departments of health across the UK.

Unite is not only the biggest union in the country leading the fight against the Government’s dangerous proposals for the NHS, we are also unique in representing such a wide breadth of professional organisations and occupations who work in the NHS. We want to make sure the voice of our professional and occupational groups is heard in the debate about what is happening to the NHS now.

The Unite 4 OUR NHS campaign has been launched to oppose the cuts and privatisations in the NHS and fight to protect NHS workers terms and conditions and pensions. Unite’s campaigning has had a huge impact locally and nationally in both halting and slowing down threatened NHS privatisations and we must continue to support our activists in their local campaigns fighting the break-up and fragmentation of our NHS.