Dear Shelter Supporters,
As you may already know, Shelter works are returning to strike action this week.
Following our strike action in March, Shelter management agreed to return to talks at ACAS, where they made a revised offer to staff.
This offer, far from resolving the dispute, poured oil onto troubled waters. Further details can be found in the attached leaflet.
Union members were balloted on whether to accept or reject the offer. It was made very clear that in order to improve the package on the
table, further escalated strike action would be necessary. Members voted to do just that - escalate strike action.
Shelter workers will be on strike across England and Scotland on Thursday 24th and Friday 25th April.
We have timed our action on 24th to coincide with the NUT, PCS and UCU strikes on the same day. In many locations we will picket our Shelter offices and then join the demonstrations and rallies with our colleagues in the the other unions.
This is a significant week in our dispute at Shelter: the first batch of dismissal notices issued to staff opposing the cuts are due to expire today. Those staff members are being told if they want to continue in their jobs, they have to sign new contracts on inferior terms and conditions.
Please find attached details of our picket lines. Do come along and support us if you possibly can.
Best wishes,
Elizabeth O'Hara
on behalf of Shelter stewards
Shelter dispute – Thursday 24th and Friday 25th April 2008
Picket lines
Shelter staff are taking a further strike action on Thursday and Friday this week.
There will be picket lines at the following locations.
Please come support us.
London
Shelter Head Office
88 Old St
London EC1V 9HU
At junction of Old St and Whitecross St
Thursday 24th - From 7.30am – 10.30am at Old St, then at 11am joining NUT/PCS/UCU march from Lincoln’s Inn Fields to Westminster Central Hall for rally.
Friday 25th – From 7.30am – 2pm at Old St
Sheffield
Furnival House
Furnival Gate
SHEFFIELD
S1 4QP
From 7.30am
Leeds
Yorkshire & North East Regional Office
Ludgate Chambers
Ludgate Hill
LEEDS
LS2 7HZ
From 7am
Birmingham
Midlands & East Regional Office
4th Floor
Gateway House
50 – 53 High Street
BIRMINGHAM
B4 7SY
From 8am – 10.15am and then again from 12 noon – 2pm
Manchester
Manchester Housing Aid Centre and North West Regional Office
Ground Floor
Victoria House
119 Princess Street
MANCHESTER
M1 7AG
From 7.30am
Edinburgh
Head Office (Scotland)
Scotiabank House
6 South Charlotte Street
EDINBURGH
EH2 4AW
From 7.30am
Glasgow
Glasgow HAC
First Floor Suite 2
Breckenridge House
274 Sauchiehall Street
GLASGOW
G2 3EH
From 8am
Here is what I put out a couple of weeks ago:
Links
Dr. Derek Wall
contact
Press Office
Shelter strike gains Green Party support and backing
5th Mar 2008
The tendering of services via the market is a way of cutting wage costs and increasing poverty rather than increasing efficiency
Green Party Principal Speaker Dr. Derek Wall today pledged Green Party support for the workers of the housing charity Shelter, who are today taking industrial action after Shelter managers demanded staff work an extra two and a half hours a week without additional pay - lost income worth an average of £1,700 per person over a year.
Despite Shelter's 2007 annual report revealing an annual income of £49.1m, with staff costs of £27.7m,(1) the charity's Chief Executive Adam Sampson emailed Shelter employees informing them: 'Those who decide that they are not prepared to work under the new arrangements will, with regret, be issued with notices of dismissal.'
Dr. Wall said
"Workers at Shelter are taking industrial action because they have been told by the homeless charity that their wages must be cut. The Green Party of England and Wales supports the strikers, and calls on Shelter to reject pay cuts for its hard working staff.
"The tendering of services via the market is a way of cutting wage costs and increasing poverty rather than increasing efficiency. It simply widens the gap between rich and poor in Britain.
"It is richly ironic that a charity that seeks to deal with one symptom of poverty in the form of homelessness, has become part of a New Labour approach that will increase poverty."
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Canvassing in Brighton back in 2017 to support Green Party MP Caroline Lucas’s re-election efforts, I knocked on a door and came acros... -
Derek Wall ’s article entitled Imperialism Is the Arsonist: Marxism’s Contribution to Ecological Literatures and Struggles , argues that Ma...
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Sat at a computer in the library, I am aware that the woman looking at the screen next to me is becoming increasingly agitated. ...
2 comments:
Derek - credit to you for mentioning the Shelter workers, but why were there no statements of support for the NUT teachers, or opposition to the 10p tax rate abolition this week? With only a week to go before the local elections, not saying anything about these two issues which affect so many people seems to be an oversight. Perhaps you have mentioned them in the past, but at the moment people who look at either the main Party website or the Sian4Mayor website hoping to find out where we stand on these have a difficult job of finding out what our positions are.
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