Mark Irvine - Blogger, Campaigner, Organiser

Jeremy Corbyn appears to be persisting with his tactic of asking questions at Prime Minister's Question Time (PMQs) which are sent to him by 'ordinary' voters. So I thought I'd draw one from a typical reader of the blog site in Lanarkshire. Jeremy Corbyn: "Prime Minister, I received a email from Margaret in Lanarkshire who says that poor advice led to her trade union making a complete horse's arse of her equal pay claim, resulting in the loss of thousands of pounds which she can ill afford as a low paid worker in Labour-run council". "Do you think that Margaret should be able to complain about the handling of her claim to an independent referee with the power to make her financially whole again, by imposing a fine on her trade union, if necessary?" David Cameron: "Well, Jeremy, that's the most sensible thing I've heard from the opposition benches in a long time and I think the vast majority of union members would agree ...

Jeremy Corbyn is up in Scotland for the Scottish Labour Party conference and yesterday delivered his first 'leader's speech' which I found dull and boring because it was full of vacuous words like these: "To me, socialism is simple. It’s about everyone caring for everyone else. "This is a kinder, more caring politics … we don’t compete, we co-operate. "But it is a politics fired by our passion for fighting injustice, in our belief that an injury to one is an injury to all … the concept of solidarity." Now I don't remember Jeremy, or the kind of people who share his politics, having anything of significance to say during the fight for equalpauy that has been raging in Scotland over the past 10 years. In fact, some of the worst offenders have been the big Labour councils who presided over pay arrangements that discriminated against female dominated jobs: carers, classroom assistants, cleaners, clerical and catering workers. Not only tha...

I was contacted by a GMB member a little while back who is now retired, but worked previously for many years with North Lanarkshire Council.   The chap had just returned from holiday to find a letter from Digby Brown (the GMB's solicitors until recently) which said that they (i.e. DB) had been informed by the GMB that his union membership had lapsed, as he was no longer paying membership fees via his council wages. As a result, having retired in 2012 this long standing member was told  that the GMB would only continue with his equal pay claim against North Lanarkshire Council if he agreed to pay £441.05 in union membership arrears. Now I said at t he time that I thought  the GMB's behaviour was completely outrageous, a modern-day version of highway robbery. Not least the union could easily have regarded the chap as a 'retired' member w hich would have allowed the GMB to continue representing his interests without demanding any further ...

The BBC reports that a transgender woman, Tara Hudson, has lost her appeal to be sent to an all-male prison. Now the Beeb doesn't go into detail about the 'headbutt' and the assault on a barista which left the chap's teeth damaged, but with incredibly violent behaviour like that I doubt Tara has much to worry about being banged up in an all-male male prison for 12 weeks. That said, it seems like the prison service has had second thoughts and has now agreed to move Tara to a women's prison after all, but what a waste of public money. Transgender woman Tara Hudson loses all-male prison appeal BBC  Somerset Image copyright - Tara Hudson Image caption - Tara Hudson was sent to an all male prison after admitting assault A transgender woman who was sent to a men's prison has lost an appeal against her sentence. Tara Hudson, 26, from Bath, was jailed and placed at HMP Bristol for 12 weeks after admitting assault. Her case prompted a campaign, back...

The Glasgow bin lorry driver whose collapse at the wheel of his vehicle caused the deaths of six people has resigned, rather than face a disciplinary hearing where he would have been asked to explain his failure to report his dangerous driving history. What a coward! Glasgow bin lorry crash: Driver resigns from council job The driver of a bin lorry which crashed in Glasgow, killing six people, has resigned from his council job. Harry Clarke, 58, was due to attend a disciplinary hearing on Friday but the council received his resignation letter earlier in the day. The hearing was called after it emerged at the inquiry into the crash that Mr Clarke failed to tell his employers and the DVLA of his history of blackouts. He was unconscious when the lorry went out of control on 22 December 2014. Erin McQuade and Jack and Lorraine Sweeney, from Dumbarton, West Dunbartonshire, Stephenie Tait, 29, and Jacqueline Morton, 51, both from Glasgow, and Gillian Ewing, 52, fro...

The news media was awash yesterday with reports on the arrest of the Glasgow bin lorry crash driver, Harry Clarke, who is accused of driving a car while banned.  Presumably, if this allegation is true then he must also have been driving while uninsured which is another selfish and irresponsible act. Says a lot about the character of a man who was given the benefit of every doubt at the time of the accident, especially on social media. Yet the families of those killed and injured must feel completely let down by Scotland's justice system.    http://www.dailyrecord.co.uk/news/scottish-news/glasgow-bin-lorry-crash-driver-6569490

The BBC reports that a former senior prosecutor, Brian McConnachie QC, has added his voice to the criticism of COPFS for ruling out any possibility, months ago, of bringing charges against the driver in the Glasgow 'bin lorry' crash. The most obvious point to have emerged from all the evidence given to the Fatal Accident Inquiry (FAI), so far, is that the driver (Harry Clarke) was not fit be be behind the wheel and while the driver did not set out to harm anyone that day, his behaviour in concealing his medical history from Glasgow City Council was a threat to public safety.   Glasgow City Council can also be criticised for failing to follow up Harry Clarke's references and had they done so rigorously, it seems highly unlikely that the driver would ever have been employed, in a driving job at least.   We now have the worst of both worlds in the sense that criminal charges have been ruled out by COPFS, albeit wrongly in my view, while the FAI descends into...

The BBC reports that the driver of the Glasgow bin lorry which killed six people had been suffering from spells of dizziness and fainting for decades before being behind the wheel on the day of this fatal accident. Now it's impossible not to feel a degree of sympathy for Harry Clarke because he will have to live with the consequences of what happened for the rest of his life, but nonetheless the fact remains that he lied to his new employer, Glasgow City Council, when applying for the job as a driver. Not only that Glasgow City Council then failed to check his employment and medical history properly and, arguably, Scotland's largest council failed in its duty of care towards the public. Yet another Scottish council fails to produce crucial documents which clearly should have been kept on a secure database - a scenario that people fighting for equal pay will be all too familiar with, sadly. To make matters worse the Crown Prosecution Se...

I've often wondered why Old Labour types attach so much more importance to 'going the extra mile' for traditional male jobs when the problems facing women at work are every bit as harsh and difficult to overcome. Take this article by Kevin McKenna in The Observer, for example, in which he argues that 270 potential job losses in the Scottish steel industry (concentrated in Lanarkshire) should be put on a par with previous national disasters caused by foot and mouth disease and by the great British banking collapse which nearly crashed the UK economy. Now I have every sympathy for the predicament of the steelworkers and their industry which is trying to cope with stiff competition from around the world and a dramatic fall in the price of steel; conditions not unlike those facing Scotland's oil industry.   But just the other day North Lanarkshire received news of even more potential jobs losses - 1,100 jobs done predominantly by low paid women council ...