Amazon workers in Coventry escalate strike action against 'disgraceful' 50p pay rise
Amazon workers in Coventry began another round of historic strike action on Monday, starting their week-long strike.
In response to a ‘disgraceful’ 50p pay rise, more than 450 staff at the West Midlands distribution centre will be walking out until Friday, 17 March as more workers join the industrial action.
Amazon workers have shared their stories of colleagues having to take second jobs, pawning their goods to make ends-meat and going to food banks due to poor pay.
Marie, an Amazon worker featured in a video by the GMB union, who is representing Coventry Amazon workers, said: “I just want better treatment, I want them to realise we are people, we’re not just numbers.”
Other staff have shared accounts of working 60 hours a week just to earn enough to pay the bills and afford to feed their family.
Workers are asking for a £4.50 rise for low paid workers, to bring their pay up to £15 an hour.
The company took a total UK revenue of £23.2 billion in 2021.
Amanda Gearing, GMB Senior Organiser, said it was ‘sickening’ that Amazon workers in Coventry will earn just 8 pence above the National Minimum Wage come April 2023.
She said it was ‘crunch time’ for the ‘Amazon top brass’, as the unprecedented week-long strike shows the anger among Amazon workers in Coventry.
“They work for one of the richest companies in the world, yet they have to work round the clock to keep themselves afloat,” said Gearing.
“Amazon bosses can stop this industrial action by doing the right thing and negotiating a proper pay rise with workers.”
The strike action will cost the company over £2 million, according to GMB figures.
The ‘David and Goliath’ battle against one of the world’s biggest companies has seen support come in from around the world and moral on the picket line has been ‘sky high’, as workers in Coventry received a flurry of support.
Amazon have continued to not recognise the union and instead ‘rule by fear’, according to Coventry worker Conor Geraghty who referred to it as a ‘corporate dictatorship’.
However, union membership at the Coventry warehouse rose from 1 in 50, to 1 in 5 as more workers joined the fight for better pay and workplace treatment.
Commenting on the first day of strike action so far, Stuart Richards, GMB Union Official, said: “It’s been brilliant having workers talk to workers on the picket line and it seems to be having an impact.”
Hannah Davenport is trade union reporter at Left Foot Forward
(Photo credit: Stuart Richards / Twitter)
Left Foot Forward’s trade union reporting is supported by the Barry Amiel and Norman Melburn Trust
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