Media Unions

National Union of Journalists (NUJ), print unions, broadcast unions

Industrial news in brief

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...

Picturehouse strikers defy threats

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...

Picturehouse strikers threatened with sack

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...

Industrial news in brief

As Solidarity goes to press, the annual general meeting of the National Union of Rail, Maritime, and Transport workers (RMT) is debating a series of motions at its annual general meeting on its relationship with the Labour Party. The RMT, whose predecessor union helped found Labour, effectively had its affiliation cancelled by the New Labour leadership in 2004, after the RMT leadership refused to censure Scottish branches which wanted to back candidates of the Scottish Socialist Party, then an active and growing force. Since then, RMT has backed a number of electoral efforts against Labour...

Industrial news in brief

On 16 June over 100 people attended a short-notice demonstration called at Brixton’s Ritzy cinema, in protest at the sacking of three trade union reps. Three reps for the Bectu union at the Ritzy were sacked for failing to report to management the contents of an email sent from a Bectu branch email address to members’ private emails, which mentioned actions that community supporters of cinema workers’ strikes planned to undertake. One other rep remains suspended and awaiting disciplinary. The implication is chillingly feudal: that workers should be compelled to report everything to their...

Build solidarity with the Picturehouse strike

Joe Booth, a young socialist, writes his thoughts about the importance of linking the Picturehouse workers’ struggle to the struggle in the Labour Party. Since October 2016 Workers′ Liberty has been helping the dispute of Picturehouse workers for the Living Wage, sick pay, and maternity/paternity pay. People should support the Picturehouse workers in their fight for a Living Wage and use the momentum of the Labour election gains to build solidarity. If Labour had won the general election the minimum wage would have increased to £10 per hour. But we still want to push the social democracy under...

Industrial news in brief

After one-week strikes in Glasgow and London, PCS members in the Equality and Human Rights Commission (EHRC) Cardiff office are on strike 29 May — 2 June. 5-9 June, coinciding with the general election, PCS members will be on strike in the EHRC’s Manchester office. The successive one-week strikes are part of an ongoing campaign against redundancies imposed by the EHRC. The campaign, involving a succession of targeted strikes, has been underway since October of last year. Employees with disabilities, older and ethnic-minority employees, and trade union activists are disproportionately...

Industrial news in brief

Cinema workers at East Dulwich Picturehouse in south London will strike on Saturday 27 May to coincide with the opening of the new Pirates of the Caribbean film. Workers at the other cinemas involved in the dispute have just voted for further strikes, and will be on strike on 3-4 June to coincide with the Sundance Film Festival, which Picturehouse hosts. Cineworld held its Annual General Meeting on 18 May and Picturehouse strikers bought some shares in order to go along and embarrass Cineworld bosses. Three Picturehouse workers asked company chair Tony Bloom for Cineworld to start paying the...

Industrial news in brief

RMT members on Northern rail struck again on 28 April. The strike was every bit as solid as the previous two days’ action, reducing the company’s service to 40% of its usual level, with scab labour being provided by managers. The union is yet to announce its next move. It will need to think carefully about what to do next, taking into account the various different situations at different Train Operating Companies around the country. At Southern, talks have been held between RMT and the employer but no resolution is yet forthcoming. This is against a backdrop of RMT members starting to come...

Industrial news in brief

On Tuesday 25 and Wednesday 26 April, National Union of Teachers’ (NUT) members at Forest Hill school in Lewisham struck for the fifth time in their on-going dispute against a management proposed restructuring to deal with a £1.3 million deficit. The management’s proposal sheds 15 teaching jobs, significantly increases teachers’ workload, radically reduces the depth of the creative aspects of the curriculum, ends any specialist English as an Additional Language (EAL) support, and massively diminishes the support for students with Special Educational Needs. In addition to the strikes, there was...

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