Trade unionists from across the Americas gather in Colombia: from Canada to Argentina and every country between – 300 members of the global union federation Public Services International will gather in Cartagena, Colombia on 7-12 September for PSI's 10th Inter-American Regional Conference. At the top of the agenda will be discussion of how to protect trade union rights, and defend the quality public services that citizens rely on from being privatised or cut in the wake of the global economic crisis.

Action for Southern Africa (ACTSA) has launched an urgent action and petition to stop the Public Services Bill in Swaziland. The action will be running until 6 September 2010. The different actions taken, together with the petition, will be handed over to the High Commission on 7 September – the first global day of action on Swaziland.

The claim that childless women at age thirty make nearly as much as men does not prove that women have gained equality. Neither does the gender pay gap. Although it is the standard measure, that statistic grossly overestimates women's economic equality. Why? Because it compares men who work full time with women who work full time. This is an accurate picture of men, but it is an extremely partial description of women. Fully one-quarter of employed women work part time.

Women are still earning less than men, although the exact pay gap depends on age. What is surprising was the discovery of a handful of occupations, out of hundreds, where women actually made more than men.

PSI Chilean affiliate Agrupación Nacional Empleados Fiscales (tax workers’ union) has announced a 24-hour national strike for August 26 to protest the sacking of more than 2,500 public employees.

PSI affliates in the UK support the National Health Service Support Federation coalition campaign. UNISON has announced that it will go to court to block government changes to the NHS.

PSI affiliate the Guyana Public Service Union is warning its members to shun what the government is calling its 2010 integrity testing exercise. In other words, using of lie detectors on staff.

On 18 August, more than one million public sector union members in South Africa began taking strike action, demanding a wage increase and changes to housing allowances and medical subsidies.

On August 16 2010 the New Zealand Government introduced two new Bills to Parliament to drastically change employment law in New Zealand. Unions including PSI affiliate the NZPSA have joined the Fairness at Work campaign to stop the changes to the law.

Europeans for financial reform is a coalition of progressive forces, ranging from NGOs to Trade Unions, citizens, academics and progressive politicians, that have come together to spearhead a campaign for real reform in our banking and financial system.

PSI joins the ITUC in calling on its affiliated unions to approach their governments to try and learn their position on the proposed APEC Labour Forum and general perspectives of labour participation in the APEC process.

PSI has 650 affiliated unions in 148 countries and territories, representing a total of 20 million women and men working in the public services around the world.

At a ceremony in Washington on 3rd August 2010, representatives of the Independent General Union of Real Estate Tax Authority Workers (IGURETA) and the Center for Trade Union & Workers' Services [CTUWS] were presented with the annual George Meany-Lane Kirkland Human Rights Award by the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations (AFL-CIO).

12 August is United Nations International Youth Day. This year, 12 August also sees the launch of the UN International Year of Youth. As the fall-out from the global economic crisis continues, Public Services International (PSI) takes the opportunity to underline the importance of policy measures to secure decent work for young people and ensure that a generation of young workers do not end up in a cycle of unemployment, under-employment and precarious jobs.

This ILO report presents the latest global and regional labour market trends for youth and specifically explores how the global economic crisis has exposed the vulnerabilities of young people around the world. In developed economies, the crisis has led to the highest youth unemployment rates on record, while in developing economies – where 90 per cent of the world’s youth live – the crisis threatens to exacerbates the challenges of rampant decent work deficits, adding to the number of young people who find themselves stuck in working poverty and thus prolonging the cycle of working poverty through at least another generation.

Public Services International (PSI) welcomes the news from its affiliate Serikat Pekerja Angkasa Pura I (SP AP 1 - Airport Services Workers Union) that the long-running industrial dispute is nearing an end, following the appointment of a new Board of Directors to the State Owned Enterprise Angkasa Pura 1 (AP1). PSI congratulates the approach to industrial relations of the new Board of Directors of Angkasa Pura 1.

UNISON members in Scotland have overwhelmingly rejected a pay offer from local government employers. UNISON's Scottish local government committee chair Stephanie Herd said: "This overwhelming rejection shows how strongly members feel about an offer that is in reality a three-year pay cut. Not only would members and their families lose out, it would be bad news for local economies across Scotland, as members have less money to spend in local shops and businesses."

The European Parliament has published a new study that evaluates the comparative advantages of public-private partnerships (PPPs) and public-public partnerships (PUPs) in urban water services in Africa. The study concludes that there are notable differences between what PPPs and PuPs can offer.

On 28 July 2010 a widely-expanded 192- member General Assembly adopted a memorable resolution recognising water and sanitation as a basic human right. The resolution proved politically divisive, with 122 countries voting for it and 41 abstaining, but with no negative votes.

The COSATU (Congress of South African Trade Unions) public service unions, representing more than 56% of employees in the public service, met on 28 July to consolidate their way forward on the current wage impasse. The public service unions, which include a certain number of PSI affiliates, appreciate the economic challenges in the country and have shown a lot of patience during this year’s wage negotiations avoiding up until now a strike. However, the strike now seems inevitable.

Representatives of the five major public service unions in Botswana were granted an interim order by Lobatse High Court judge, Onkemetse Tshosa, stopping the government from de-recognising them. The five public sector unions had taken the government to court over a new law which the unions said required them to reapply to receive recognition as representative trade unions.

Strikers who have been blockading the electricity supply on Wallis Island for the past four months are now claiming they have taken over French company Suez and its subsidiary Electricity of Wallis and Futuna (EWF). The group also claims they have the backing of the King of Wallis, who announced through a spokesman that the public supply contract with EWF had now been terminated.

“How do the EU-wide imposed austerity plans affect women?” This is the question EPSU has raised with several members of the European Commission in an open letter. If there are negative impacts EPSU wants to know what the Commission will do about them.

PSI asks affiliates to send a letter of support for our members in the public water utility known as Acuavalle S.A. in Colombia, which is facing the threat of privatisation. Acuavalle serves the Valle de Cauca area, one of the most important departments in the country with major cities and the country’s largest seaport. The union, SINTRACUAVALLE, indicates that the public utility serves close to 600,000 people and is effective and efficient.

Public Services International (PSI) requests affiliates to take immediate action on the UN General Assembly resolution titled The Human Right to Water and Sanitation. By declaring water and sanitation a human right, this historic resolution is a critical step to addressing the misery and deaths that result from not having clean water and sanitation. The right to water and sanitation is supported by many PSI unions and allies.

PSI General Secretary Peter Waldorff visited Colombia 20-24 July 2010, as part of a mission arranged by “Justice for Colombia”, an organisation set up by several British trade unions, NGOs and members of the European Parliament.

Trade unions in Ukraine are struggling against unlawful arrests of their members, and government decisions taken in violation of existing agreements.

The Italian Supreme Court of Cassation is considering a petition to defend water as a common good and to remove it from the grasp of the private market. "There has been an extraordinary mobilization, more than 1.4 million people have participated,” said Paolo Carsetti of the Forum Italiano dei Movimenti per l’Acqua (Italian Forum of the Movements for Water), a national network that has been collecting signatures for a referendum against the privatisation of Italy’s water system.

The European Trade Union Confederation is staging a European Day of Action on 29 September 2010 with the message "No to austerity – Priority for jobs and growth!" The Day of Action will include a Euro-demonstration in Brussels and trade union actions in other European countries.

PSI and EPSU have been following with great concern the deteriorating situation with trade union rights in Turkey. At the recent International Labour Conference, the arrests of Ferit and Belkıza BEŞTAŞ EPÖZDEMİR were specifically raised by a spokesperson from the workers’ group; as were the cases of our SES colleagues.