Workplace news in brief


Tube strike

RMT members working for Tubelines on London Underground are due to strike on 23 November. This is over pensions and travel facilities.

The union is battling to allow the Tubelines staff to join the more favourable pension scheme enjoyed by Transport for London (TfL) staff and to get the same travel passes. Tubelines is now a subsidiary of TfL.

Tubelines staff are responsible for maintenance and upgrade work on the Jubilee, Northern and Piccadilly lines and some other essential services including the Emergency Response Team.

Amnesty International

Workers at Amnesty International were on strike on 20 November in a dispute over job losses. 300 Unite members at Amnesty’s International Secretariat and 145 at the UK HQ were on a 24-hour strike after management tried to impose new contracts with poor redundancy arrangements.

They then proposed scores of redundancies. This is the third strike in two months for the UK staff.

Management are attempting to restructure both the international and UK offices – at considerable costs to their staff, who have called on the secretary general, the senior leadership team and the UK director to stand down.

Crossrail

On 14 November in London there was an impressive protest outside the Oxford Street entrance to the Crossrail Tottenham Court Road site.

Sacked Unite shop steward Frank Morris was joined by Sparks and supporters from London, North West, Wales, Yorkshire, Midlands and Scotland who stopped rush-hour traffic for a while before voting to continue the protest on the pavement.

We encourage our supporters to continue to give support to Frank on his daily protests outside this site or the Westbourne Park Crossrail site 7am-12noon Monday-Friday.

Two months ago, 28 construction electricians working for EIS were sacked on the Crossrail site at Westbourne Park in West London.

This was done by the consortium of contractors BFK. BFK have tried to argue that this decision was because of a reduction in work but we believe that it is a blatant act of trade union victimisation and blacklisting.

Rob Williams

NSSN

A very successful Midlands conference of the National Shop Stewards Network (NSSN) was held in Birmingham on 17 November.

The conference opened with a speaker from each of the unions affiliated to the NSSN as well as national secretary Linda Taaffe.

There was a detailed debate about the problems faced by trade unionists. The need to keep pressure on the TUC and individual union leaders to implement the POA motion passed at the TUC calling for coordinated strike action against government policy was prominent.

People left with a renewed determination to deliver action that will knock the Con-Dem government’s cuts roadshow off course.

Clive Walder , NSSN Steering Committee