Black cabs
Workers at Coventry black cab maker LTI, staged a sit-in on 31 October before entering talks with administrators, PWC.
The sit-in was in response to the ruthless sacking of over 150 highly skilled workers.
Manganese Bronze is the last car manufacturer left in Coventry, a city once famed for its vast car industry.
Unite has called for the workers to be reinstated and demanded the government steps in to save the firm.
Socialist Party members quickly went down to the factory, when news of the occupation broke. We give full support and solidarity to the LTI workers and will be supporting any further action that is taken to defend jobs, conditions and to save production at the factory.
The unions must demand that if Manganese Bronze is unwilling to maintain production in Coventry and protect skilled jobs and manufacturing, it should be nationalised.
Lenny Shail
NHS strike
On 1 November admin and clerical workers at the three hospitals making up the Mid Yorkshire NHS Trust took strike action in defence of pay.
Management at the hospital want to foist the massive debt from a rip-off PFI deal that built a new hospital at Pinderfields onto the backs of low-paid staff.
They want to move them down a grade, which will see staff lose between £1,700 and £2,800 a year.
The workers are also threatened with compulsory redundancies.
Newly elected shop steward for medical secretaries, Andrea Busfield, explained: “We’ve been pushed to the absolute limit with these proposals.
“The Trust is spending hundreds of thousands of pounds on an outside management consultancy, while wanting to cut our pay by up to 20%.
“The new PFI hospitals have put the trust in massive debt and we’re the ones that are paying the cost for that.
“They are reducing staffing levels by such an extent you wonder who’s actually going to be there to staff these buildings and provide patient care.”
Iain Dalton
Tesco drivers
Unite members waved union placards on the picket line saying ‘Tesco – every sacking helps’. This was as 186 Tesco drivers in Doncaster started a three-day strike on 31 October against job losses and wage cuts.
Tesco, not content with £3.8 billion profit last year, transferred their Doncaster transport workforce in August to Eddie Stobart Ltd (ESL) to cut costs.
Then ESL, whose own drivers are on £2.50 an hour less than the Tesco drivers, issued notice of termination of employment on 5 September, with no promise that the drivers will be re-employed once the 90 days are up.
