Adam Harmsworth
Coventry Socialist Party
The ballot for statutory recognition of GMB union at Amazon’s BHX4 Coventry site was exceptionally narrowly lost. 49.5% of the 2,600 workers voted for GMB to be recognised, short by just 28 votes!
The union has been built up for nearly two years, following spontaneous sit-in protests in 2022 after Amazon gave workers an insulting 35-50p pay rise. Then, GMB only had a few dozen members. Now it has over 1,000 members who have struck more than 30 times. GMB organisers have overcome hurdles of language barriers and a broad lack of understanding of what a trade union is and does. In the recognition campaign, information was translated into twelve languages.
The biggest hurdles, however, have come from Amazon itself. It is a notoriously anti-union corporate giant, which has used a range of repressive measures to prevent and smash workers’ organisation in Britain and at sites across the world. At BHX4, and to a lesser extent other sites, it has not been able to contain workers’ anger at poverty pay, cruel conditions, and bullying management.
For months before the recognition ballot process began at Coventry, Amazon had stepped up its attacks on unionisation. Workers were bribed with free meals on strike days. Anti-union messages popped up across the site – from TV screens to posters in toilet cubicles. Union members reported that managers were drafted in from other sites just to lurk around the warehouse speaking to staff about the ‘dangers’ of the union. QR codes were placed across the canteens with a direct link to cancel GMB union membership. Workers were pushed into attending multiple anti-union seminars.
Not achieving recognition is a set-back for GMB’s campaign at Amazon, but only to an extent. The workers have achieved a great deal without recognition and despite the attacks from Amazon.
GMB officials reported the news with a defiant attitude, writing on X/Twitter: “The fight has only begun – no retreat, no surrender”, “The Fight Isn’t Over Until We Win”, “When we get knocked down, we get back up again”.
The activists are determined to keep the fight going. Within hours of the ballot result, GMB members at Amazon, supported by Coventry Trades Union Council, protested outside the BHX4 site, chanting “no surrender!” and “the workers united will never be defeated!”
Amazon is now facing a legal challenge over claims the company pressured workers into cancelling their union membership – an Inducement Claim.
GMB members’ campaign in Amazon has received support from a swathe of the workers’ movement, from local trade union branches to the Trades Union Congress (TUC) itself.
The unions should put pressure on the Labour government to support the Amazon workers. For a start, Labour should immediately raise the minimum wage to £15 an hour – a key demand of Amazon workers – and scrap the anti-union laws, including the 1992 Act that prevents a new ballot for recognition for three years. The same anger at Amazon for its anti-union repression should also be put on Labour for letting the attacks go unchallenged.
The very slim defeat at Coventry Amazon has only encouraged the reps and activists in GMB to keep up the campaign for decent pay and work conditions. In this era of more volatile politics and attacks on workers, it is vital that trade union strength, solidarity, and organisation is built up across the working class. As employers come to Amazon to learn how to fight back against their workers, so the working class must learn from its battles like at Amazon to fight back, win, and put bosses like those at Amazon in their place!
