Unite Community Leeds & Wakefield

12/10/2026

📢 Calling all young trade union members across the North East, Yorkshire & the Humber!

We're getting together online for our next TUC Young Members Group meeting and would love you to join us!

📅 Tuesday 13 October 2026
⏰ 6pm – 7pm
💻 Online via Microsoft Teams

We'll be chatting about upcoming events, including the Newcastle Young Workers Patrol and 2027 Organising School, sharing workplace and local campaign updates, and looking at how we can develop the group.

Whether you've been involved before or are new to the group, everyone is welcome! Come along, share your ideas and meet other young trade unionists.

🔗 Join the meeting here:
https://teams.microsoft.com/meet/3632981660948415?p=1w2ym4KtDSXd5ZXizP

✊ Hope to see you there!

09/10/2026

09/10/2026

09/10/2026

Big thanks to Unison Leeds Teaching Hospitals for making us so welcome at today’s 💜 ❤️ 💙

Truly excellent turnout among Teaching Hospitals Perioperative Assistants. These hard-working Theatre Assistants are paid only 21 pence per hour above minimum wage despite performing essential support to nurses and surgeons in operating theatres, This Trust, unlike many others across the country, has refused to increase hourly pay from £12.92 to £14.05 to reflect the fact that these workers are increasingly being called upon to conduct numerous band three tasks. Read more on why these workers are taking action through the link in the comments 🔗

Lots of solidarity too from the rest of the labour and trade union movement, as well as wider civil society: We spotted delegations from UNISON branches across the region and even beyond the Pennines! Not to mention supporters from local branches of other unions, and campaigning organisations like the chapter of Keep Our NHS Public. Plenty of cheers for Leeds TUC representatives too and their £250 strike fund donation! East Leeds MP Richard Burgon praised the strikers for leading by example to the wider working class in fighting for what they deserve, and Councilors Kevin Ritchie (Bramley & Stanningley) and Cristiana Mirosanu (Chapel Allerton) also joined the solidarity attendees. Morale was already high but helped by the stylings of activist and union solidarity stalwart Joe Solo. This is by no means an exhaustive list of groups and individuals who showed up!

LTHT Theatre Assistants will be back out again on their indefinite strike action from Monday next week unless you hear otherwise. And we’ll be there to join them! ✊

In the meantime, you can show your support by signing the workers’ petition (see below this post) if you’ve not done so already 👇



Strike Map Keep Our NHS Public - Leeds YorkCityUnison UNISON Rotherham Metropolitan Borough Branch UNISON Yorkshire & Humberside

09/10/2026

Repeated freezes have left Local Housing Allowance rates trailing far behind real rents. Rent controls would cut the cost of restoring the link by slowing rent growth.

09/10/2026

The Resolution Foundation has conducted research that concludes working families are worse off by some £2900 a year thanks to the cost of living squeeze over the past five years.

Analysis shows:

⬆️families were spending 57 per cent more on energy in real terms than before the pandemic.
⬆️the UK has experienced the equivalent of 13 years’ worth of ‘normal’ inflation, with prices nearly 30 per cent higher.
⬆️The proportion of poorer renters behind on rent was 22 per cent, double the 2020 level and close to its peak.

Working class people cannot take this anymore.

Its high time bold decisions were made to redistribute the wealth that energy companies, big business and billionaires have enjoyed in periods of burgeoning inflation.

And it has to happen at the November budget John Healey

https://www.resolutionfoundation.org/publications/counting-cost/

09/10/2026

Households across the UK have faced years of near-continuous cost-of-living pressures 📈

Now, a new report by the Resolution Foundation has found that the cost-of-living crisis has caused real incomes to fall by almost 8%, leaving the typical family £2,900 worse off.

One of the biggest culprits? Energy costs 💡

Last year, our report found that energy bills had risen by 42% since 2021, while energy companies made £30 billion in profits in just one year 😳

And as soaring energy bills continue to fuel the crisis, millions of households have been forced to cut back on heating. Around 1.7 million families were unable to keep their homes warm enough in 2022/23 compared with the previous year.

People are having to choose between heating their homes, buying food and paying the bills.

So what’s the solution?

Public ownership of utilities to put an end to profiteering and put people before profit 📣

09/10/2026

🚨 TOMORROW - National March for Palestine - End the Genocide
⏰ Saturday 10 October, 12PM
📍 Victoria Embankment, London

After 3 years Israel continues to commit genocide against the Palestinian people in Gaza. Join our march on 10 October to stand with Palestine and take action to end its complicity in Israel's crimes.