Strikes and lock-outs

Food couriers can win a living wage!

Food couriers working for online delivery services are conducting a wave of wildcat strikes across England. The drivers seek a minimum pay of £5 per delivery, plus £2 per mile travelled, from large online platforms such as Deliveroo, Uber-Eats, JustEat, Stuart and others. Strikes have already taken place in London and the south east, Sheffield and the West Midlands, involving thousands of drivers and costing Deliveroo 20% of their national earnings, as well as wiping millions from their share price. The most recent strike, on 1 March, saw over a hundred couriers in Birmingham city centre form...

Couriers to strike every Friday

Drivers for Deliveroo, Uber Eats, Just Eat have announced strikes every Friday and bank holiday over pay. This comes after two successful strikes in February. The demand of the strike is £5 minimum for each order. Because food couriers are designated as “self-employed” they have no guaranteed basic pay, getting variable fees for each delivery. They also don’t have automatic rights to sick pay, holiday pay, pensions or parental leave. A recent report looked at pay in the sector and found most platforms couldn’t provide evidence that workers’ pay was minimum wage after costs. Delivery Job UK...

Couriers out again on 23 February

On 23 February, from 5 to 10pm, food couriers will be taking their third day of strike action this month over low pay and poor working conditions. The strikes have been organised by Delivery Job UK, a group largely run through social media, popular among Brazilian delivery drivers in particular. Strikes on 2 and 14 February were patchy by area, but impressive in many places, with hundreds of couriers stopping services and Deliveroo offering astronomically high prices for scabs to break the strike. Action on the 14th brought dozens of drivers directly outside the house of Will Shu, Deliveroo co...

Northern Ireland: new strikes set for 27-29 February

Following Northern Ireland’s huge public sector strike on 18 January over pay, the Irish Congress of Trade Unions has said that “industrial action will continue” until an offer is made “that workers can accept.” Pay awards for public sector workers have not been made since the Democratic Unionist Party (DUP) collapsed the devolved government in October 2022, in protest against post-Brexit trading arrangements. The Northern Ireland (NI) Assembly and Executive were restored on 3 February, with public sector pay placed high on the agenda of incoming ministers. ICTU’s comments came after a meeting...

Food couriers strike 14 February

On 14 February food delivery couriers are set to strike over pay. The strike is not being organised by a union but by a social media-based group called Delivery Job UK, and it mostly involves couriers working for Deliveroo and Stuart. Some couriers working for other apps are also involved. A strike also took place on 2 February. The 2 February action saw thousands of couriers, mostly in London, but also in cities across the UK, stopping deliveries. The delivery apps tried to break the strike by offering astronomical fees to those riders who did accept orders. Patchy picketing and protest...

Amazon strikes again at BHX4

Workers at Amazon’s BHX4 facility in Coventry will strike again on 13-15 February. Their campaign of strikes to win a £15/hour minimum wage has now seen them take over 30 days of action. The GMB union’s membership at the warehouse now stands at over 1,000. The strike comes after union members recently voted to renew their industrial action mandate for a further six months. Amazon has upped its anti-union efforts, distributing leaflets within the workplace saying the GMB wants to speak “for” workers whereas Amazon wants to speak “to” them: “You don’t have to join a union to have your voice...

Junior doctors strike 24-28 February

British Medical Association junior doctors in England fighting for “pay restoration” — a real-terms wage rise this year, and a clear plan to restore their pay to the real-terms level of 2008 — will strike again for five days this month, from the morning of Saturday 24 February to Wednesday 28 February. Other trade unionists, activists, and everyone who supports workers’ rights and the NHS should join their picket lines and demonstrations, and push for active solidarity from our unions and organisations. When their current legal mandate for strikes under the anti-trade-union laws expires at the...

The longest strike in NHS history

In August 2023 over 400 health staff at Wirral University Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust (WUTH) began strikes in a dispute over pay. They have now had 50 days of strikes. Clinical support workers (CSWs) assist nursing staff on the wards. They’re employed across the trust’s sites at Arrowe Park and Clatterbridge hospitals on the Wirral. CSWs on the band 2 pay scale had routinely been undertaking clinical tasks like taking and monitoring blood, electrocardiogram (ECG) tests, and inserting cannulas. They should be on at least a band 3 salary, which is nearly £2,000 a year more than they...

Amazon faces more strikes after Sutton Coldfield action

Workers at a new Amazon fulfilment centre in Sutton Coldfield, Birmingham, struck on 25 January, demanding a £15/hour minimum wage and other improvements to terms and conditions. Although the GMB union’s membership at the site represents only a small minority of the workforce, the strike has an outsized symbolic significance. Previously GMB’s campaign of strikes in Amazon has been centred on the BHX4 warehouse in Coventry, where it has its largest membership base (plus one strike at a site in Rugeley, Staffordshire). Even a minority strike at a new site can be an important beacon for spreading...

"Toward the zero hour": Support the GKN workers!

Workers at the occupied GKN car parts factory at Campi Bisenzio in Italy, near Florence (Firenze), have made an international appeal to support their plan to launch a co-operative producing cargo bikes and solar panels. The struggle they have been waging since 2021 is now under threat, with workers facing the sack and eviction on 1 January 2024. Update: the campaign seems to be suggesting that they have successfully pushed back the deadline; but it is not clear. More soon. The workers' statement is below, above links to more information and to actions you can take. GKN and the asset-stripping...

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