June Update

A collage of some of the supporting photos we have received / taken

Sorry for the delay in posting this, but things are moving on a daily basis, making it very difficult to choose the point at which to give an update.

Currently, after further political interventions by John Thurso and Danny Alexander, HMRC are actively investigating the possibility of alternative, cheaper, office accommodation offered by Highlands & Islands Enterprise.

Issues remain, however, around the work that would be done in these new premises, as thanks to a Recruitment Freeze over the past five years, HMRC's Compliance section (the people who chase up tax dodgers) say they are worried about succession planning.

Campaigners have highlighted that this is, in effect, a vicious circle - the department decided to close Wick Office, so they didn't recruit anyone new.  Because there's nobody new, they believe they have to close the office.  The Wick Wants Work Campaign has therefore drawn up a petition at http://wickwants.epetitions.net/, which we would ask you both to sign and to share widely with friends and colleagues in support of the Campaign to bring work to Wick. 

With a bit of lateral thinking, the succession solution that Wick Wants Work Campaigners see as the obvious one is to recruit new blood into HMRC Wick - Unemployment in the area is high, and there is a skilled potential workforce in the area who would love the chance to get involved in closing the Tax Gap and working to create a better society. £900 million is being reinvested into HMRC Compliance work, and there is no reason why a tiny fraction of this could not be invested in Caithness to succession-proof Wick.

While Wick Wants Work Campaigners are advancing these arguments, however, the sword of Damocles hangs over the Office.  At the start of June, Voluntary Redundancy offers were made to staff under the terms of the new Civil Service Compensation Scheme.

The new scheme, which was imposed against the wishes of staff by an act of Parliament, is structured in such a way as to penalise staff for failure to volunteer for redundancy - and, even if the should choose voluntary redundancy, is worth less than 2/3 of the entitlement of many under the former scheme.


A further meeting is being arranged with John Thurso MP, and Wick will be high on the agenda when the PCS Union holds a reception for MPs on the 6th of July.

Your support thus far has been invaluable, and we hope you will sign the petition at http://wickwants.epetitions.net/ and share the link as widely as possible to add to the pressure on HMRC to commit to supporting the Caithness economy.

Campaign Launches Tomorrow

According to Stewart Lee, the 41st best Standup Comedian in the history of the world ever, everyone needs a manifesto.

This, I guess, is ours.

Wick is a wee town (population 7,333) in Caithness, in the (very) far North of Scotland.  The local economy has just suffered a major blow with the announcement that 2,000 jobs are to go in the next few years from the Dounreay power station, the biggest local employer by far.

HMRC, the Government Department formed through the merger of the old Inland Revenue and HM Customs & Excise, currently employ twenty staff in Wick,  but they have announced their intention to close the office permanently, offering only a one-day-a-week face to face service, staffed by two people.

The Public & Commercial Services Union, which represents the twenty staff facing the axe in Wick, believe that the removal of the permanent HMRC presence in Caithness is in no way necessary, and, supported by the local Council, the local TUC, and the local Community, are campaigning for the retention of these jobs in the local economy.

We believe that, with a tax gap of £120,000,000,000 across the UK, and the vast majority of HMRC work entirely portable thanks to IT improvements, there is a perfectly sound rationale for the retention of the HMRC presence in Caithness, and, indeed, there could easily be an expansion of HMRC employment in the area to the benefit of the UK exchequer.

We oppose the closure of HMRC Wick.

We support the Closure of the Tax Gap.

We have not given up on Caithness, even if HMRC seem to have done so.

To this end, we support all campaigns for the retention and creation of jobs in Caithness, and oppose any cuts in public services until every last penny owed to the exchequer has been collected, and everybody is paying their fair share.

There you go, a manifesto.

Please support the Wick Wants Work! Facebook page here: http://tinyurl.com/6hxog4h

A petition will soon be posted online, and your signature to that would be invaluable.  This is about 20 people, and the wee community they live and work in - they need all the support they can get.