Tag: Unite

Travel industry workers’ plea for help to rescue industry and save jobs

The trade union, UNITE, staged a day of action yesterday at Manchester Airport in support of the hard-hit travel industry.

The union is calling for tailored support for the industry brought to its knees by the Covid 19 pandemic and is demanding greater transparency in the government’s traffic lights travel restriction scheme.

Unite also wants the Coronavirus Job Retention Scheme to be extended for the aviation sector beyond the current cut-off date of September, while government restrictions are preventing travel, to protect jobs, routes and airports and to ensure that the UK still has a viable industry when travel can safely return to normality.

Unite members and their supporters also took part, with other unions and the TUC, in a lobby of parliament organised by trade association Airlines UK, and the travel industry.

The protest was backed by Wythenshawe MP Mike Kane, Labour’s spokesperson for aviation. He said: “1.6 million jobs depend on the UK’s aviation sector which contributes Ā£22 billion to the UK economy. This is why I am supporting #traveldayofaction.”

Unite assistant general secretary Diana Holland said: ā€œIt is totally unprecedented for all areas of the aviation sector and the travel industry to come together with a joint call of action for the government.

ā€œHopes of a gradual recovery in the aviation sector have been placed in the deep freeze as a direct result of government policies. Therefore the government has a moral duty to act and act swiftly.

ā€œAviation is essential to the long-term success of the UK’s economy, and to keeping people connected. If a meaningful, sustainable and resilient industry is going to be in place when travel can return, then the government must provide immediate support for the workers who will make this happen.ā€

TUC in Manchester: delegates back calls for “people’s vote” on Brexit

Trades unionists meeting in Manchester this week have backed a “people’s vote” on Brexit if the Government fails to negotiate a good deal.

Some trade union leaders oppose a second referendum on whether to leave the European Union.

But the TUC’s Europe spokesman, Steve Turner, called on delegates at the annual congress to “rise like lions” if the deal is bad for British workers.

He told the conference: “This is not a call for a second referendum, a place some outside our movement want to push, but a vote on the terms of our departure if parliament fails us.”

Mr Turner, Unite’s Assistant General Secretary described the attempts by the government to negotiate a Brexit deal as shambolic.

But he warned that the Labour and trade movement must work to heal divisions left by Brexit to avoid the rise of the far right in communities that feel abandoned by the political elite.

He said: “A betrayal of the Brexit vote without answers will only add to a crisis of belonging and identity that could find its way onto our streets with a rapid and dangerous rise of the far right.

ā€œIt demands we rise like lions to the challenges for our class, to the threat of a hard-right Tory attack on working people as well as the threats from bosses who think they can use Brexit to shed jobs, relocate and off-shore our work or put a match to hard won terms and conditions, rights and protections.

ā€œIt demands MPs reject a disastrous no deal and send a defeated, broken government back to the country in a general election.Ā It demands we extend Article 50 to give an incoming Labour government time and opportunity to negotiate a deal for the many, not the few.Ā And if the politicians can’t do that, then we demand we go back to the people so they can vote on the deal on offer.

ā€œIt’s our deal, our future, not theirs.

Congress we need a better, fairer Britain. We need to heal the wounds. Only our movement is capable of doing that.ā€œ

Read Steve Turner’s speech in full,Ā here

So, if Dominic Raab returns from Brussels with no deal, or with a deal that’

Bus drivers due to strike after “1p an hour pay rise” offer

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Pic: Micolo J Thanx 4 cc

Bus drivers at Arriva’s Wythenshawe depot will walk out on Monday (Nov 20) after pay talks with unions collapsed on Friday.

No Arriva buses will be running in Manchester after the company’s final pay offer, was rejected as an insult by trade unions, Unite and the GMB.

The unions, which will stage nine days of strike action in the run up to Christmas, said the pay rise offered by Arriva bosses amounts to 1p an hour for drivers. Continue reading “Bus drivers due to strike after “1p an hour pay rise” offer”

Wythenshawe councillor backs striking post office workers

Webb__C_2015Wythenshawe councillor Chris Webb has backed post office workers on strike today.

The Northenden Labour councillor has sent messages of solidarity and support to members of the Communication Workers Union and Unite who are staging a 24-hour walkout over closures, job losses and working conditions.

 

The industrial action is expected to have the most impact on 300 Crown Post Offices in town and city centres.

A union picket has been mounted at the Manchester CIT depot, Admiral House on Thompson Street today

Dave Ward, general secretary of the CWU, said the Post Office was at “crisis point”, and urged the government to stop the “cycle of closures, job losses and attacks on workers’ terms and conditions”.

Ivan Monckton, of Unite, accused the government of presiding over an “ill-managed decline” of the Post Office.

Kevin Gilliland, the Post Office’s network and sales director, said the Post Office regretted the unions’ decision to strike.