Chief Executive talks to the Guardian

Bit of a late "news" story we know but we would like to welcome the comments in the article especially the quotes attributed towards UNISON.

The article was released in the Guardian on 02/10/2013 and includes many direct quotations from Peter Sloman http://www.theguardian.com/society/2013/oct/02/peter-sloman-oxford-city-council-houses

"We have demonstrated that you don't need to privatise services. We've also proved that you can motivate people. We do not want to see our services externalised to a for-profit organisation. We should be an exemplar for running those services,"

"For me, if you want to get the best out of the public service workforce, you're not going to do it by privatising them, by handing them over to companies they can see are not as able to manage services locally as the council themselves,"

There were favourable references to our Pay Deal but with no attributable quote.

UNISON feels the attributable quotes about not needing to privatise services are a welcome assertion; however, UNISON does recognise that the sentence 'We do not want to see our services externalised to a for-profit organisation' does complicate the message.

Does this mean that we have demonstrated that we don't need to privatise services; but if we do, they can only be to non-profit organisations, like Fusion?

What does this say about "part-privatisation"? Using Capita as an ever increasing "overflow" for the Contact Centre or Mouchel for administration tasks. Are these "for profit organisations" and do they pay the Living Wage? How do we know they are "exemplar for running those services"?

UNISON does sympathise with the complexities of these issues and can see how newspapers can blur quotations and mis-represent particular key points. But, we would like to see some clarification regarding (what we can see as) the blurred message which can be in the form of  a re-asserted rebuke and a re-affirmation that at Oxford City Council:

THERE WILL BE NO PRIVATISATION OF SERVICES.