Support the Mitie strikers at Manchester airport

Cleaners at Manchester airport have been outsourced to Mitie for the last couple of years, and they haven't been easy years.

The workers say that at the time of the transfer, they were told there would be no redundancies, yet within a month about 10% of the workforce was cut, leaving the survivors with a heavier workload.  Too often, competition for contracts between bidders isn't about a better service, or organising the work better, but simply about delivering the lowest price by driving people to work longer and harder for less.  In this case the cleaners get just £6.95 an hour and have had no pay rises for four years.  At this rate they will soon be on the National Minimum Wage.

But even this isn't enough for Mitie.  They want to cut attendance bonuses and paid breaks, which would leave workers about £96 a month worse off.  They're also chiselling away at other terms - even cutting compassionate leave from 3 days to 1 (could you organise a funeral in a day?) and stopping workers swapping shifts.

On Friday, the Mitie workers went on strike in defence of their paid breaks.

Mitie is a giant company, with lots of subsidiaries, but a quick look at the records for just one of them, Mitie Cleaning & Environmental Services Ltd, gives you a clue as to the scale of the operation, built on the hard work of low-paid workers like those at Manchester Airport.

You can send messages of support to the workers via their UNITE officer, Dave Kennedy.

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UNITE Policy Conference

There's lots of information about the conference appearing on the UNITE web site, and I won't attempt to rival or duplicate that, but rather provide a few updates from a sectoral slant.

The delegations from both the Electrical Engineering and Electronics (EEE) and IT & Communications (ITC) sectors were small, making me worry that some of our Regional Industrial Sector Committees (RISCs) are not working effectively.

Conference agreed motion 11 from the Coventry Area Activists Committee dealt with the need for investment and R&D, highlighting the decision of Ericsson to close its Ansty site with the loss of 700 jobs.

Motion 35 from the EEE National Industrial Sector Committee (NISC) promoted the idea of a European Minimum Wage policy, building on the national minimum wages in many countries, and helping prevent the "race to the bottom" where countries try to undercut each other. The motion was agreed (despite nobody standing up to propose it).

The text of all the motions is on the web site, but there is a sentence missing from the end of motion 35.

Composite 8 comprised motion 42 from the ITC NISC and motions 43 from the East Midlands ITC RISC, both of which proposed affiliation to the Right To Work campaign. Since the motions were submitted, the Executive Council had decided that it didn't want Policy Conference to decide on any affiliations at all (which seems wrong to me personally) and would oppose any motion that included affiliation. The movers decided that rather than removing the bits about affiliation, which was really the point of the motions, they would remit it for the EC to consider.

Conference agreed motion 59 from London & Eastern ITC RISC, which called for a positive right to strike, noting the difference between European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) judgements supporting the right to strike and contrasting them with the European Court of Justice (ECJ) rulings which put free trade ahead of human rights.

Many members in EEE may be affected by the decision to try to find a way to revive the "drive for 35" campaign for a shorter working week through the Confederation of Shipbuilding & Engineering Unions. The campaign in the 1980s had successfully reduced the working week for large numbers of workers in engineering and beyond. The levy which formed a vital part of the campaign had left a fund of many millions of pounds, which is now almost impossible to access. Conference agreed an Executive Council (EC) statement that (subject to legalities) should allow the fund to be used and the campaign revived. Conference was given a commitment that the EC will be kept regularly updated on progress.

Another highlight was a packed fringe meeting with BA Cabin Crew, standing up against their bullying boss Willie Walsh in a campaign that is vital for working people in every industry.

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Glasgow and Warwick

Following the disastrous result for Labour in the Glasgow East by-election, UNITE issued a robust press release pointing out that it is New Labour policies being rejected by voters and our desperate need for change.

Perhaps it's not surprising that there's a distinct lack of comment from our union since the outcome of the "Warwick II" Policy Forum at the weekend. Press coverage has varied wildly, often with little apparent grounding in facts.

Most of the outcomes, like those from "Warwick I", wouldn't look amiss in an episode of Yes Minister - along the lines that we are firmly committed to considering the possibility of consulting about the idea of a review about X.

The only really tangible change seems to be a slight reduction in the number of young people who will be discriminated against through the National Minimum Wage, by making the adult rate available at 21 instead of 22.

But perhaps the most damning sign of how bad the agreement is the vague and feeble attempt by some to sing its praises. As an example, look at the UNISON press release.

The message to working people from Warwick must surely be "fight for your rights, don't put your hopes in Labour".

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Age Discrimination & Minimum Wage

It is a ridiculous and unjustifiable anomaly that we now have legislation against age discrimination, but still a minimum wage set at a lower rate for young people. If young people are doing the same work, why shouldn't they get the same pay?

The argument that it would discourage employers from taking on young people is increasingly tenuous, when a key concern of many employers is the demographic changes meaning there are fewer young people leaving education and entering the workforce, forcing them to look more seriously at employing older people or those who would previously have been excluded from the workforce.

Good to see the TGWU section of UNITE lobbying for a better minimum wage, but what a shame this protest didn't have a higher profile.

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