Welcome to UNISON Greater London
Our members are people working in public services or for private contractors providing public services and essential utilities.
They include frontline staff and managers working full or part-time in local authorities, the NHS, colleges and schools, universities, the electricity, gas and water industries, police services, transport and the care and voluntary sectors.
Members are organised into 125 branches across Greater London.
As well as defending public services and fighting the government’s cuts to public services, our priorities are promoting equality for all our members and campaigning for a living wage.
UNISON is proud to be a member-led union. Democracy is central to our structure and our achievements have been won as a representative, democratic union where everyone has an equal voice.
All branches in the Greater London region elect delegates to the regional council, the senior membership body which oversees the work of the region representing and supporting members. It also includes delegates from the service groups and self-organised groups in the region.
The regional council meets three times a year. One of those meetings is the annual general meeting which elects a regional committee (which meets between regional council meetings) and a regional convenor, who is the senior lay member. There are also regional structures for each of UNISON’s seven service groups and membership groups.
UNISON also employs staff in the region to support branches and members, including regional organisers, area organisers and local organisers who work closely with branches.
The Greater London region is proud to be the most diverse region in UNISON.
The Regional Diversity Forum (RDF) is a sub-group of our Regional Committee and is made up of representatives from Regional Committee, all regional self-organised groups, service groups and Labour Link Committee.
We have the responsibility of co-ordinating the region’s equality work; including monitoring representation and proportionality of branch officers, activists and those attending our training courses. We also ensure that equality is on the agenda of every regional level committee/group and we have also developed the Regional Equality Strategy, which strengthens the work that we do within our region, workplaces and branches
We know that equality issues are not an ‘add-on’ or a ‘bolt-on’ to everyday trade union work, they are at the core of what we as trade unionists do. Dealing with equality issues is not ‘more work’ – it is the work of the union.
Every trade unionist, every UNISON member or activist has a duty to challenge discrimination wherever they see it. The Greater London Region will ensure that members and branches have the tools available to do this; through providing guidance and promoting equality work throughout the region.
The Regional Equality Strategy underpins the principles of equality and encourages the mainstreaming of equality issues throughout the region and branches. It will include ensuring that good news stories around equality issues and best practice from branches and self-organised groups are publicised.
The Regional Equality Strategy will be a living document that will be regularly reviewed and will be continually developed. Overall, the responsibility for the implementation of the strategy lies with the Regional Committee.
The RDF is chaired by the Regional Equalities Convenor.
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