50 signatures reached
To: Kelvin Blake, Labour Party Councillor
Fair Pay Now For Workers at Second Step
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We are the workers of Second Step: we are support staff, frontline practitioners, administrators, and many others who keep services running and provide vital care and support to community mental health services.
Every day, we help people through some of the most challenging moments in their lives, ensuring their care remains safe, compassionate, and effective.
Every day, we help people through some of the most challenging moments in their lives, ensuring their care remains safe, compassionate, and effective.
Yet for years, Second Step staff have faced below-inflation pay rises. The most recent increase of 2.25–2.75% represents another real-terms pay cut at a time when the cost of living continues to rise. Staff are being asked to do more with less, while their pay falls further behind the true value of their work.
Many employees are also carrying out Band 4-level responsibilities while being paid £1,800–£3,000 less than equivalent roles in the NHS. This affects staff retention and equality in the sector.
Kelvin Blake, you are a Labour party councillor and Chair of Board at the Second Step. Will you make a statement in support of our demands for fair pay and union recognition?
Kelvin Blake, you are a Labour party councillor and Chair of Board at the Second Step. Will you make a statement in support of our demands for fair pay and union recognition?
Why is this important?
Workers have called for formal union recognition so staff can negotiate pay, terms and working conditions collectively with Second Step management. While meetings have been productive, recognition has yet to be granted, leaving workers without a meaningful, organised voice in decisions that directly affect their livelihoods and the quality of services provided.
We call on Second Step to recognise our union formally, commit to fair and inflation-reflective pay, and address the widening pay gap between Second Step roles and equivalent NHS and AWP positions.
Fair pay and fair representation are essential not only for staff, but for the stability and future of the services our communities rely on. When workers are respected, services are stronger.
We would like to highlight Kelvin Blake's conflicting position; on one hand, he is a councillor representing constituents who are struggling to buy food and access housing as their pay is not meeting the rate of inflation, and on the other hand he is the Chair of the Board of Second Step and his silence is deafening.
As a Labour councillor his government have bought in the Employment Rights Bill – which among other things provides improved facility time for union reps and lifts many constraints on union activity – and yet Kelvin is silent about the industrial action happening in his constituency. This silence is palpable as Union reps struggle to engage with Second Step leadership in meaningful negotiations.
We say to Kelvin: many of us are your constituents and we are asking you to make a statement in support of our campaign. This would be particularly impactful in your position as Chair of the Board.
We would like to highlight Kelvin Blake's conflicting position; on one hand, he is a councillor representing constituents who are struggling to buy food and access housing as their pay is not meeting the rate of inflation, and on the other hand he is the Chair of the Board of Second Step and his silence is deafening.
As a Labour councillor his government have bought in the Employment Rights Bill – which among other things provides improved facility time for union reps and lifts many constraints on union activity – and yet Kelvin is silent about the industrial action happening in his constituency. This silence is palpable as Union reps struggle to engage with Second Step leadership in meaningful negotiations.
We say to Kelvin: many of us are your constituents and we are asking you to make a statement in support of our campaign. This would be particularly impactful in your position as Chair of the Board.
Stand with Second Step workers and support fair pay, fair conditions and union recognition. Sign to show your solidarity with our campaign and to support our message to Kelvin.