(AP Photo/Brittainy Newman) Talks have taken a complicated routeĭespite multiple sessions of high-pressure talks throughout last weekend - and repeated threats of strike that could paralyze part of the supply chain - the union said that concessions made so far had faltered on compensation issues. Contract negotiations between UPS and the union representing 340,000 of the company’s workers broke down early Wednesday with each side blaming the other for walking away from talks. UPS workers “practice picket” at Teamsters Local 804 outside of a UPS facility Thursday, July 6, 2023, in the Brooklyn borough of New York. Stuart Richards, the GMB’s organiser for the West Midlands, says that since the results of the Coventry strike ballot were announced in December, the union has been hearing from a growing number of frustrated workers at other Amazon facilities, keen to make their voices heard.“The result of this, if they’re recognizable gains for workers as a result of collective action that the union really can deliver, is that will send a very powerful signal to workers at Amazon and workers at other places that there’s a powerful union that’s really prepared to take collective action and effective action on their behalf,” he added. The economic backdrop has also darkened since the union first began organising, last summer: retail sales fell by 1% in volume in December, which underlines the tough challenges facing the sector.Īmazon recently announced plans to close three warehouses in the UK, as well as seven smaller delivery sites, putting 1,300 jobs at risk.īut the GMB members hope that they can draw the public’s attention to the conditions faced by some of those whose work lies behind the brown cardboard parcels arriving daily at doors up and down the UK. And unlike thousands of nurses, doctors, teachers or train drivers, industrial action by these 300 warehouse workers is unlikely to have an impact that impinges on anyone’s daily life. It says its members are currently paid £10.50 an hour, so that would represent a 45% rise. The GMB’s £15-an-hour pay demand appears punchy, to say the least. It also points to a £500 cost-of-living payment offered to all staff over the busy Christmas period.Īmazon is right about the numbers: the GMB union has signed up about 300 members at the Coventry site, and estimates that total staff numbers 1,400 or more.īut the union nevertheless regards Wednesday’s action as a historic step in a 10-year battle to organise inside Amazon’s warehouses across the UK, in the face of the company’s well-documented hostility to trade unions. The company claims to be relaxed about the stoppage, insisting that the strikers represent a small proportion of its workforce in Coventry, and that their action will have little or no impact on its operations. Since the Coventry result was announced, the GMB has heard from frustrated workers at many other Amazon facilities The local Labour MP Taiwo Owatemi is also supportive, having listened to the experiences of workers at the warehouse, which is on a site previously occupied by carmaker Jaguar Land Rover. It’s a story heard in campaigns by Amazon workers worldwide, including in the US, where there have been some notable recent successes in winning union recognition.ĭerrick Palmer, a vice-president of the US Amazon Labor Union, which recently won a recognition battle at an Amazon fulfilment centre in Staten Island, New York, has backed this week’s action in Coventry. “I don’t want Jeff Bezos’s boat,” he said. One worker recently told the Guardian that it was impossible to make ends meet without signing up for a 60-hour week. But staff also complain of gruelling round-the-clock shifts and constant, nitpicking monitoring by management.
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