Unite

New Campaign Campaigns

• 

  Darchem Engineering: #PayTheRate to your Hinkley Point metal workers

  Darchem Engineering in Stockton-on-Tees manufactures industrial pond liners for Hinkley Point, as part of £200 million contract. It's skilled work, maintaining critical safety infrastructure that's vital to Britain's nuclear power capacity. But workers there are angry about a growing pay discrepancy between roles in the same team. Welders' pay has risen to more than £2 an hour above that of the team's platers and sheet metal workers. Unite members' attempts to close this unfair pay gap through negotiation have been met with refusal by the company, so workers have taken the last resort of voting to strike. Industrial action by Unite members is taking place on dates throughout June, and could continue longer if the employer does not come to the table. This is a dispute that would be easy for the employer to solve. The pay gap is arbitrary, between workers that all have vital skills for the job. With reported £17 million profits and a £69 million shareholder fund, the company can well afford to increase the pay for the platers and sheet metal workers. And at a time of huge pressure on workers' standards of living, closing the gap and paying everyone a fair rate would make a huge difference. Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: "Darchem Engineering is making millions from the UK taxpayer so it has no right denying workers on a UK project a fair rate of pay. It needs to get a grip or their actions will cause further problems to the Hinckley site. Unite will be giving our members at Darchem Engineering our total support until the unfair pay disparities are fully resolved." Darchem Engineering need to sit down with their workers' unions - Unite and GMB - and resolve this dispute. Please help us raise the pressure on Darchem to #PayTheRate by writing to the company's President now.

  282 of 300 Signatures

  Created by Unite the Union
• 

  Support the 1st female Bus Driver at Queens Road - She deserves better!

  Tracey Scholes has been a bus driver at the Queens Road depot for the past 34 years. When Tracey started her journey as a bus driver in 1987 she was the first female bus driver employed at the Queens Road depot. The industry back then was very male dominated and a woman taking a driving position was challenging to say the least however Tracey took the challenge and has had the full respect of all her colleagues. Over the years Tracey has been instrumental in paving the way for other women to take up positions within the passenger sector. Tracey is a hardworking, loved and valued member of the NW/5/4 Branch and the Queens Road family who deserves to be commended for her years of service to the traveling public of Greater Manchester, however Go North West Ltd has dismissed her from employment because THEY changed the manufacturer specification on their fleet of buses resulting in five foot tall Tracey being physically unable to operate some company vehicles. Go North West Ltd have refused to consider proposals from Tracey and her Unite trade union reps to keep her in employment. This has resulted in her unfair dismissal from Go North West Ltd for capability to fulfil her role a PCV driver. The company’s only resolution is to offer Tracey a position in the company that would see Tracey’s pay and hours cut significantly leaving her in financial hardship.

  29,217 of 30,000 Signatures

  Created by Lee Lomas
• 

  Help protect the workers who care for the graves of our war dead

  We are Commonwealth War Graves Commission (CWGC) staff. We are British citizens who serve overseas in countries such as Belgium and France, maintaining and caring for the cemeteries of our fallen heroes. We are proud of our role in ensuring that the 1.7m people of the Commonwealth forces who died in the First and Second World Wars, will never be forgotten. We now need your help. With just three weeks’ notice and despite our many years of loyal service, the CWGC has given us a stark choice: be repatriated back to the UK or face having our incomes halved. This is happening it us as we’ve been told that we will no longer be entitled to UK contracts after 31 December 2020, when the Brexit transition period ends. But switching onto new contracts means changing to our country of employment’s tax code and changes to pensions and other terms and conditions, which could see us lose up to 50% of our income. To be given just three weeks’ notice to making life changing decisions on whether to uproot our lives and that of our families in the middle of a global pandemic when jobs are scarce is terrifying. So is accepting losing up to half of our income. We are desperate. We now need the minister Ben Wallace to intervene on our behalf to protect our terms and conditions and put pressure on the CWGC to talk to our unions. Please help us by emailing the minister.

  6,176 of 7,000 Signatures
• 

  Coventry Council: Reinstate Pete Randle, stop union busting, stop strike breaking and pay the rate

  Pete is one of the 75 refuse workers in Coventry City who have been on an all-out strike since 31st Jan over a pay dispute. • The Council is reported to have spent in the region of 2.8 million of taxpayers’ money trying to break the strike and using contractor Tom White Waste to break the picket. • It would cost less than £300,000 to resolve the dispute, but it seems Coventry City Council is hell-bent on wasting taxpayers’ money. • Just recently, Coventry Council published an important untrue statement, saying the bin lorry drivers earn up to £52,163 a year. The truth is the hourly pay rate is £11.49-£14.37 meaning the lowest-paid earns a basic wage of just £22,183 a year. • This council has a history of wasting taxpayers’ money, including on fat cat salaries and golden handshakes. • Former deputy chief executive, Martin Yardley, was given more money than any other council staff member in the whole country in 2019/20 pocketing £573,660. • In 2018, the retiring finance chief waltzed off with just shy of £450,000. An attack on one is an attack on all! Please sign the petition

  11,775 of 15,000 Signatures

  Created by Unite the Union
• 

  Demand £10 an hour for cleaning staff at the University of Sheffield

  Throughout the pandemic, cleaning staff at the University of Sheffield have worked hard to keep others safe. They work unsociable hours, are overwhelmingly women workers and have no path to improved pay on the current university pay scale. Now, with the support of Unite the Union, these key workers are organising to improve their pay and conditions. But they'll need your support to win. If they can afford to pay Vice-Chancellor Koen Lamberts £285,000 a year, they can afford to pay cleaning staff £10 an hour. The university has no excuse not to recognise the critical work cleaners have done throughout the pandemic. All workers deserve dignity and respect - please add your name to support cleaning staff and their campaign for £10 an hour. This petition is just the beggining. Add your name and join the campaign. Work at the University of Sheffield? Not a member yet? Please join Unite here and support our campaign: https://join.unitetheunion.org/

  14,121 of 15,000 Signatures
• 

  Lloyds Banking Group - Pay your staff - not just shareholders!

  Lloyds Banking Group has announced that it will reward its shareholders with a £1.4 billion pay-out and a £2 billion buy-back scheme after making astronomic profits of £5.9 billion after tax in 2021. But in spite of these incomprehensible numbers, the bank has abandoned its workers to the cost of living crisis by implementing a pay rise which is well below inflation levels. For years, many of us have served the bank on low salaries of around £22,000 - answering phone-calls night and day, protecting customers from fraud, & inputting information. We and our families now stand to be pummelled by the cost of living crisis - which will see the biggest drop in living standards since the 1950s - while the bank stands back & willingly lets it happen. How can it be fair to pay shareholders billions, while we can barely keep our heads above water? Instead of being the CEO who prioritised already-wealthy shareholders and abandoned workers in the middle of a catastrophic living-standards crisis, we demand that Charlie Nunn do the right thing and meet our demand for an inflation-matching pay-rise. While this would be a drop in the ocean for the bank - it would make a world of difference to us.

  1,676 of 2,000 Signatures

  Created by Unite the Union
• 

  CHEP UK - Your Pay Offer is unPALLETable!

  CHEP UK is a hugely profitable company, yet it is refusing to give its workers a pay rise that reflects the true value of their work & takes into account the UK's soaring living costs. While the Retail Price Index is currently over 7.5%, CHEP UK, which made profits of £60 million last year, has offered its workers a below inflation pay rise. This means a pay cut for CHEP workers in real terms. Rather than look after its workforce, CHEP appears to be more interested in boosting profits and rewarding its shareholders - who received a £50 million pay-out just last year. This has left the company's workers with no choice but to take a stand through strike action. We are asking you to support our campaign and demand that CHEP give their workers a fair pay rise and bring this dispute to an end. Simply put: workers should not be facing an attack on their living standards while company shareholders are raking in millions of pounds. Deliver Fair Pay for CHEP workers NOW!

  332 of 400 Signatures

  Created by Unite the Union
• 

  Community opportunities not just waste at Skelton Grange

  The new Waste to Energy plant planned at Skelton Grange could be a chance to bring hundreds of good, skilled jobs to the Leeds area. The £250m build project will have a huge impact when finished, powering 100,000 local homes. We need to ensure that terms and conditions are protected and enhanced, so we can bring everyone with us as we transition to a greener future – sustainability and development at the same time. We want an end to undercutting on pay and conditions, which harms our communities and creates resentment rather than collaboration. The National Agreement for the Engineering Construction Industry (NAECI) is comprehensive set of terms and conditions of employment for hourly-paid engineering construction workers on major projects across the UK. It’s a nationally agreed standard for good work in construction, and it’s a way to make sure that new projects meet their responsibilities. We think the NAECI agreement should be the baseline for everyone working on the build of the Skelton Grange Waste to Energy plant. It’s a commitment to the community that was proposed early on, but we are worried HZI and Leeds City Council will try to quietly drop this important safeguard if we don’t raise the pressure on it now. Join us and demand HZI and Leeds City Council get round the table with the unions Unite and GMB and agree to establishing NAECI standards across the site.

  737 of 800 Signatures

  Created by Claire Peden, Unite the Union
• 

  Tell Coventry Council’s leader the ball is now in his court to settle the Coventry bin strike

  We must stand strong against bad bosses unnecessarily attacking workers and using anti-trade union tactics. Coventry City Council and their Labour Leader, George Duggins have failed the people of Coventry and they have failed the workers. Can you help us by writing an email to him, asking him to reinstate Pete, stop union-busting, stop strike breaking and pay the rate?

  1,837 of 2,000 Signatures

  Created by Unite the Union
• 

  Support the Svitzer Strikers

  Tug boat crew members employed by Svitzer Marine Ltd at Teesport are taking strike action after their employer imposed a 0% pay award. Teesside is seeing a boom in freight volumes currently and Maersk, the parent group for Svitzer, is forecast to make a profit of nearly £12bn for 2021. That success has been thanks to the hard work of their skilled and experienced crews, who have helped keep the port running throughout the pandemic. Svitzer can easily afford to give their workers a decent pay rise, but they are refusing to negotiate with the crews and their union, Unite. When inflation and the cost of living is at a 30+ year high, these workers have been left with no alternative but to take strike action, starting on 1st March. The tug crews have taken a brave step in standing up for their right to a fairer pay deal, with a 100% yes result in their strike vote. Can you please help show them and their employer that the community is behind them? Please send an email to the CEO of Svitzer, calling on him to get round the table and negotiate with the crews and their union.

  1,169 of 2,000 Signatures

  Created by Ryan Holroyd-Case, Unite the Union