UK workers are demanding a pay raise and better conditions, saying ‘robots are treated better’
Amazon union workers in the UK are striking for the first time ever. They are complaining that their wages are below inflation-linked rates and are describing working conditions as “severe.”
Members of the GMB Union working at the retailer’s warehouse in Coventry voted to hold a “historic” industrial action after Amazon offered a 50-pence-per-hour (62 cents) increase in pay last month. The workers have rejected what they called a “derisory” pay rise, demanding instead an increase to £15 ($18.48) per hour.
The 24-hour strike began on Wednesday after midnight, with GMB saying it expects 300 employees out of a total of 1,000 at the plant to turn up to the walkout.
“After six months of ignoring all requests to listen to workers’ concerns, GMB urges Amazon UK bosses to do the right thing and give workers a proper pay rise,” GMB senior organizer Stuart Richards said in a statement.
Last August, Amazon offered to increase pay to between £10.50 and £11.45 per hour which employees interviewed by the BBC said was a “smack in the mouth” given the company’s profits and spiraling inflation.
“These people had worked two years through the pandemic, that had seen Amazon’s shares go through the roof, they had seen the profits just become unimaginable,” a company warehouse worker, Darren Westwood, told the media outlet.