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NUJ raises freelance concerns at National Pensioners Convention
BEV MORRISON
THE NUJ’S 60+ council delegates took part in a show of support for Unite’s 68 is Too Late pensions campaign in Blackpool, during a break in the annual meeting of the National Pensioners Convention (NPC). Covid had forced the convention, formerly called the
Pensioners’ Parliament, to meet online for the past four years. Although numbers were down, nearly 200 members from throughout the UK attended the two-day event. Expert speakers led a range of panel sessions covering pensions, tax, fuel poverty, health and social care, transport, housing and digital inclusion and exclusion. In the opening rally, Jack Jones, the TUC’s pensions policy
officer, challenged a widely held assumption that pensioners were mostly wealthy. He pointed out that the UK state pension was one of one of the lowest in the developed world, and one in four people in deprived areas did not live to pension age. The NPC has been and remains a vociferous campaigner for
the reinstatement of the triple lock, which Lord Bryn Davies, in his talk on the future of the state pension, said was important to retain.
During question time, Jenny Vaughan, the 60+ council’s pensions lead, challenged speakers for saying “very little about the self-employed, of special interest to the NUJ, as nearly half our members are freelance”. She said many found it hard to save enough in private pension schemes. Although speakers acknowledged the issues, none had any serious solutions. In another session, the convention heard how the NPC, along
with three other older people’s organisations – Age UK, Independent Age and the Centre for Ageing Better – is campaigning for an independent commissioner for older
people and ageing in England, which Wales and Ireland have both had for many years. Digital exclusion is one of the issues the NPC hopes a
commissioner for England would champion for older people. On the morning of the session The Future is Digital: Making it
Work for us All, the House of Lords published a report that found the government had “no credible strategy to tackle digital exclusion”. NUJ delegate Jenny Sims, chair of the NPC’s digital working
party, was a key speaker at The Future is Digital session. She brought the report to members’ attention and reminded them that the NPC’s digital inclusion campaign, Connections for All, was the result of a successful NUJ resolution at their biennial delegate conference five years ago. Since then, the NPC’s membership has fallen from 1.5 to 1.1 million. It is trying to recruit new affiliate organisations, groups and individual members. South African-born Ellen Lebethe, NPC vice-president and chair of the NPC’s ethnic minority working party, said the organisation needed positive action on equality, diversity and inclusion issues if it was to recruit new members.
Award for student achievers The Bob Norris Award for
THREE aspiring journalists have been named as the latest high achievers in annual awards dedicated to the memory of NUJ stalwart Bob Norris.
Achievement in Journalism winners were nominated by their university tutors. Each received a trophy,
certificate and cash from the LEEDS AND WEST YORKSHIRE NUJ BRANCH Happy birthday, Radio Leeds
WHEN NUJ members in Yorkshire gathered to wish BBC Radio Leeds a happy 55th birthday this summer, one of its original staff members was on hand to blow out the candles. Mike McGowan was a producer when Radio
Leeds was launched in 1968 as one of the UK’s earliest local radio stations. Now an NUJ life member, he has joined current staff in opposing reductions to such services around the country, standing with them on recent picket lines.
06 | theJournalist The NUJ is in dispute with the BBC over its
plans to cut local radio output by almost half, including by cancelling shows and making local stations share content across regions. “Now is the time for the BBC to get to grips with public service broadcasting and expand, not reduce, its local radio network,” said McGowan. “Listeners to local radio deserve better than cuts to valued local programmes, and BBC management must rethink its plans.”
NUJ Solent branch, of which Norris was a former chair. Joe Brennan, 22, who was born in Portsmouth and lives in Southsea, has completed his third and final year in
journalism. The second year took two attempts because of health reasons. Sajidur ‘Saj’ Rahman, 21,
was born in Poole and lives in Ferndown, Dorset. He has completed his third year in sports journalism.
“
Speakers said very little about the self- employed, who are of special interest to the NUJ as nearly half our members are freelance
Jenny Vaughan Pensions lead , 60+ council
Andigoni ‘Noni’ Needs,
56, was born in Halifax and lives in Liss in Hampshire. She studied the NCTJ (level 5) diploma in journalism at the City of Portsmouth College in 2022-23.
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