Living wage

On 2 January a notice appeared on the staff noticeboards of some McDonald’s stores announcing a significant pay rise for workers. Pay for under 18s will now go up to a minimum of £5.75, under 21s to a minimum of £6.75, under 25s to a minimum of £7.95, and over 25s to a minimum of £8 in London. All workers will get an above inflation pay rise of between 5.4 and 6.3%. It is the biggest pay rise McDonald’s workers have had in 10 years. A Bakers’, Food and Allied workers’ Union (BFAWU) organiser told Solidarity : “There is no doubt that this is a direct result of McDonald’s employment practices...

On Thursday, 14 December, 2017 I attended a picket of Hackney Picturehouse against the mistreatment of the workers at the cinema and every other Picturehouse and Cineworld cinema in the United Kingdom. The Picturehouse workers have been on strike now for over a year: they’re paid £9.30 per hour, no access to sick, maternity or paternity pay, and the managers are refusing to negotiate with them. This simply cannot continue! No workers at such cinemas can give you tickets to watch Star Wars, pizza and coke to enjoy whilst relaxing, if they don’t receive enough money for a decent home, TV or any...

The local government employers have proposed a two year pay offer for council and school support staff workers of 2% in 2018 and a further 2% in 2019. Unison, GMB and Unite, as the largest unions representing local government workers, will now put the offer to their respective committees for consideration. Initial statements from the three unions suggest they at least partially welcome a wage rise that is above the 1% pay cap, but it is well below the level needed to restore anywhere like the 20% cut that workers have faced since 2010. The last national strike action taken in local government...

After twelve weeks of strikes, Unite members have agreed a deal to settle a long-running dispute over changes to waste management services in Birmingham. On balance, this has to be considered a victory for the workers. The Labour council have agreed to withdraw proposed redundancies in exchange for giving the affected workers new job titles and duties. Grade 3 workers will now be promoting recycling among residents but still be working on bin lorries and maintaining their current grade, pay and conditions. In addition a victimised shop steward will be reinstated, unions will be included in a...

Picturehouse workers at the Ritzy cinema in Brixton, and East Dulwich, Crouch End, Hackney and Central Picturehouses struck on Sunday 5 and Monday 6 November for the start of Living wage week. On 6 November the new Living Wage was announced, and in London it rose from £9.75 an hour to £10.20 an hour. Striking on the day of this announcement meant the strike gained national press coverage, including on ITV news, as the press covered the raise in the Living Wage. Strikes completely closed the Ritzy cinema in Brixton and partly closed other sites. The Mayor of Hackney joined picket lines at...

PCS members at Eastern Avenue Jobcentre in Sheffield started a continuous month long strike on 23 October in opposition to the closure of the site. On the same day it was announced that members at Plymouth Processing Centre, another site marked for closure had voted 76% in favour of strikes to defend that site and would begin their strikes on the 6 November. Members at Eastern Avenue have already struck for 27 days since the proposal to close the Jobcentre was announces earlier in the year. The closure of both sites is part of the Department for Work and Pensions’ (DWP) estates rationalisation...

On Wednesday the 11, October Jeremy Hunt told the House of Commons that the 1% pay cap will be lifted for NHS staff. After the government buckled under pressure and lifted the public sector pay cap for police and prison officers, the government had shown it was weak and it was only a matter of time before it was forced into lifting the cap for other workers. Hunt has failed to say if the pay rise will be funded, or whether NHS employers will have to find the money within existing, too tight, budgets. So will NHS employers be left with the ″choice″ of making cuts elsewhere in order to fund pay...

On Wednesday 4 October, workers from five Picturehouse sites walked out on strike, in the face of intimidation and threats of dismissal from Picturehouse management. We walked out and converged on Leicester Square where the opening gala for the London Film Festival, organised by the British Film Institute (BFI), had a red carpet of big names from the film industry. Whilst most of the great and the good at the gala tried to ignore the angry cinema workers inconveniently blocking their path from the champagne reception to the red carpet, some supported us. Actor and director Andrew Garfield...

Workers’ Liberty school workers met on 7 October 2017 to discuss our plans in our workplaces and in the new National Education Union, formed on 1 September by the merger of the National Union of Teachers and the Association of Teachers and Lecturers. The new union is making a recruitment drive, offering membership free to trainees and students, for £1 to newly qualified teachers, and for £10 for the first year to all teachers and all school support staff. The response has been good, with twice as many new recruits to the NEU in September 2017 as there were to the NUT and ATL in September 2016...

Workers at Picturehouse cinemas will strike again on 4 October at the start of the London Film Festival which is being held at two of the London Picturehouse cinemas. Workers at the Ritzy cinema in Brixton, Hackney Picturehouse, East Dulwich Picturehouse, and Picturehouse Central will all strike from 3.30pm on 4 October. Workers at Hackney and Central will then strike from 5-7pm on 6-8, and 11-15 October with walk-outs timed to disrupt premieres and big London Film Festival events at those cinemas. On 15 October all sites will strike again to disrupt the closing gala at Hackney Picturehouse...