GFTU BGCM 2019 Minutes

increase of 24%. President, Conference, this is, of course, a very important

resolution before us and our sisters and brothers in Community do need

congratulations for continuing to place mental health before the wider

movement as an issue of concern, but we need, I think, to understand that this

is not just an issue for the trade union movement, although, of course, it is that.

It is also an issue for every caring man and woman throughout these islands. I

am proud on behalf of Voice to second the motion. (Applause)

THE PRESIDENT: Thank you very much. I call on Ronnie Draper from the Bakers

Union.

BRO RONNIE DRAPER (Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union): Chair, delegates,

Ronnie Draper from the Bakers, Food and Allied Workers Union, absolutely

speaking in support of the motion. I just want to put forward some of the

difficulties that we face and put them into context. In October 2018 Phillip

Hammond said that they were going to increase funding in mental health areas

of the National Health Service to make sure there was provision for everything,

but it was going to be spread over five years. We have most certainly seen in

the first seven or eight months that there has been absolutely nothing coming

forward. If anything, standards are going down. Five years. It is not five years

we need, we cannot wait five years. We need investment and proper

investment right away. It is a rerun of the same promises that were made in

2012 by the same Government saying what they going to do as far as mental

health went. To say the progress has been slow is an understatement. It has

been absolutely pathetic.

Remember, when they talk about these meagre movements within mental

health, they are not talking about just in the workplace, they are talking right

across society and if you look at the Government’s record on workplaces,

again, it is pathetic. We are the last in the pecking order when it comes to

giving out finances for anything. They put us way down that list, whether it be

on salaries, protective legislation, zero hour contracts, the Trade Union Act that

they brought in that was taking all stuff away from trade unionists’ right to

protect other trade unionists. That is what the Government are doing and we

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