Link to this page: http://www.socialistparty.org.uk/issue/706/13917
From The Socialist newspaper, 22 February 2012
Tyne and Wear Metro cleaners
No choice but more action
Transport union RMT member Richie Veitch recently wrote a letter to his local paper about the cleaners on the Tyne and Wear Metro, whose pay and conditions have been severely undermined since the Metro was privatised. This is an extract from his letter.
The way the Tyne and Wear Metro cleaners are being treated by the company is nothing short of outrageous. In the latest attempt at undermining the trade union movement, the management sees fit to dismiss one of their employees without hearing his case in the way agreed between the company and recognised trade union - of course one suspects that this tactic was deployed by the company to avoid having to go to (yet another) employment tribunal as they already have over 25 waiting to be heard.
In another dramatic episode of mismanagement, the company this week told all of its employees that they had lost their tax codes! Now it is left to the employees, who are paid the national minimum wage and suffer from the most draconian terms and conditions I have ever known, to chase up the tax office in their own time.
I strongly suspect that the latest attack on the workforce maybe the straw that breaks the camel's back. They have no choice other than to respond industrially and show this shambolic, greedy, privateer that they will no longer accept being treated like slaves in a Victorian workhouse. I wouldn't blame them if they did.
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In The Socialist 22 February 2012:
Socialist Party youth and students
Main parties have no solution to youth unemployment
Defend education - Join the student walkout
Socialist Party feature
International socialist news and analysis
Romania: Protest movement topples the government
Kazakhstan: Defend workers' leaders
Socialist Party workplace news
Sparks defeat Balfours - now for total victory over BESNA!
Support the workers at MMP packaging
Organising against the cuts in Greenwich
Socialist Party reports and campaigns
800 celebrate life of Rob Windsor, a socialist champion of Coventry's people
Wales: A tale of two conferences
'Capitalism fails the poor' agree Oxford University students!
Portsmouth: Anti-cuts activists present an alternative budget
Gateshead: Children's healthcare under threat
Reviews and readers' comments
Fans not financiers should run football
Should socialists support the proposed HS2 rail link?
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