You can now find photos and videos of the Security Officers’ two-day strike on our Facebook page. Thanks to everyone who came out and showed support!
https://www.facebook.com/pg/IWGBunion/photos/?tab=album&album_id=621628234702810
And thanks to Peter Marshall for this album:
See our letter to Chris Cobb below:
Dear Chris
As you know, security officers at the University of London will be striking next week over zero-hours contracts, inadequate payslips, and broken promises on pay that has meant an effective 25% pay cut.
Many of these staff have worked here for years, and they are extremely reluctant to cause any disruption to fellow staff and students.
However, the University and their security contractor Cordant have given them no alternative. Despite the reasonableness of their demands, all efforts at negotiation have been ignored.
It has now come to light that rather than make any effort to meet these employees and avert this damaging strike, the Cordant is planning:
If the University is aware of this, it is breaking its London Living Wage commitments and openly encouraging the use of zero-hour contracts in order to break the strike. Furthermore it will also be legally culpable should a fire or other serious incident occur without trained staff on hand to handle it.
Can you therefore confirm that the University will instruct its contractor to abandon this plan, and instead offer a fair solution to the issues raised by its employees?
Can you also confirm that the University is guaranteeing that it is providing a safe environment for staff and students, as it is legally required to do?
Best wishes
Danny
Danny Millum
Treasurer
IWGB
Around ten University of London buildings will be shut down on 25th and 26th April as the majority of the central university’s 60 security officers go on strike.
The Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) sent today the notice of industrial action to Cordant, the company that has the contract for the provision of security officers in the University of London’s central administration buildings. The union is demanding an end to zero-hour contracts, proper itemised payslips, and a 25% increase in pay for all security officers, increasing the salary of the lowest paid officer to around £12 an hour.
While the pay of other workers at the university has increased in recent years, that of security officers has stagnated, breaking a commitment the university had made in 2011 to maintain pay differentials between different types of workers.
“The security officers strike at the University of London goes to the heart of the problem of outsourcing in universities,” said IWGB General Secretary Dr Jason Moyer Lee. “The university blames the contractor, the contractor blames the university and the workers lose out. Let’s see if paralysing the university’s operations for two days pushes them to act.”
Cordant has so far been unwilling to negotiate with the IWGB on the matter of pay, while the University of London has said dealing with this issue is not its responsibility.
“We are determined to take industrial action, which has been caused by the university breaking their promise,” says University of London security officer and IWGB representative Abdul Bakhsh. “We do not want to disrupt the lives of students, who we are here to help, but we feel we cannot do our job properly if the University doesn’t keep its promises.”
The strike will affect the following university buildings: Senate House, Stewart House, the Institute for Advanced Legal Studies, Student Central (formerly University of London Student Union), the Warburg Institute and five halls of residence: Nutford House, Lilian Penson, Connaught Hall, College Hall and International Hall.
The IWGB is a campaigning union, which has waged a number of high profile campaigns such as for the London Living Wage at the Royal Opera House and at John Lewis, and the 3 Cosas Campaign (sick pay, holidays, and pensions) at the University of London. Other campaigns have been waged over bullying and harassment as well as improved pay for university employees (London Weighting).
For more information:
Dr Jason Moyer-Lee, IWGB General Secretary
press@iwgb.org.uk
Security officers at the University of London are fighting back against zero-hours contracts and pay cuts!
The University of London’s security officers will be striking for the first time ever in the next few weeks.
Security staff work long shifts, round the clock, and are here to help every day of the year: bank holidays, University closure days, even Christmas day.
They’re friendly, professional, and highly qualified. They support and protect staff and students alike in these uncertain times.
Why are they striking?
Their demands are simple:
1. No zero-hours contracts
2. Proper payslips for everyone
3. The University of London to honour its promises on pay
The University of London promised when it introduced the London Living Wage that it would maintain pay differentials.
It has completely failed to keep that promise, with the result that since 2011 security officers have seen their relative pay decline by a massive 25%
Security officers tried to resolve this by writing a petition letter to ask for the difference to be reinstated, then organised a group meeting with their managers.
The response? There will be no pay rise, and security officers’ holidays for the next two months, even ones that have been pre-booked, are being cancelled!
IWGB ran a ballot for strike among its members – the result was 100% in favour of taking strike action.
The strike will take place in the next few weeks – but every day of strike means money lost for these already low-paid workers.
Donating to the strike fund will help us compensate workers – and make it more likely that the strike will succeed!
https://www.crowdpac.co.uk/campaigns/1870/the-independent-workers-union-of-great-britain
With a successful ballot under our belts, we’re planning strike action. Here’s a flyer explaining the reasons for the campaign and what you can do to help.
Please also see, share and donate to our new Crowdpac strike fundraiser – https://www.crowdpac.co.uk/campaigns/1870/the-independent-workers-union-of-great-britain
You can download the flyer as a PDF here: https://iwgb-universityoflondon.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/04/security-strike-flyer2.pdf
BREAKING NEWS! The strike ballot results are in! Security officers have voted 100% YES to strike action over pay!
We have just sent the results to Cordant!
We are one of the first unions to successfully ballot under the new Trade Union Act. John Gallogly of the Electoral Reform Services (who ran the ballot) told us: ‘Excellent turnout and one of the first to close with the new requirements’.
We will be announcing strike dates imminently!
Any questions please contact us via uol@iwgb.org.uk.
BREAKING NEWS!
Yesterday University of London Security contractors Cordant told staff that ALL ANNUAL LEAVE would be cancelled for April and May because of the planned IWGB security guards strike. This included porters, postroom staff, AV – workers who have nothing to do with the strike!
Unsurprisingly, this caused uproar!
Today Cordant have issued a new decree – annual leave will now be authorised for all staff APART FROM SECURITY!
All of this shows two things – they are panicked by the prospect of a strike AND they don’t know what they’re doing!
Meanwhile YES ballot papers are apparently being returned on a daily basis!
Hasta la victoria!
LATEST NEWS:
Inside sources have told us that yesterday Cordant’s senior management team plus lawyers were summoned to a meeting with the University of London, almost certainly to discuss the security officer pay campaign.
The University has clearly been rattled not just by the impending strike, but also by IWGB General Secretary Jason Moyer-Lee’s email threatening legal action against Cordant.
We’ll keep you posted!
We have received an incredible letter from Tanya Vittorio, a representative of Cordant, which claims that we’re not in dispute and threatens striking members. Our General Secretary, Jason Moyer-Lee, has replied at length to refute the claims that Ms Vittorio makes, and to affirm that our strike ballot is lawful and will continue:
Tanya Vittorio wrote on Friday 10 March 2017:
Dear Sirs,
With regards to the above matter. I have now taken instructions from our operations team and they in turn have discussed matters with the University of London (UOL).
Whilst we have seen the email from the UOL to the IWGB in 2011 we do not consider this to give rise to any contractual entitlement. The UOL were not in a position to create legal relations with your members (our employees).
As we have given no undertaking to ensure that pay differentials are maintained no legal entitlement arises.
In addition we do not accept your assertion that some of our workers are on zero hours contracts. The workers you are referring to are on annual hours contracts and therefore you have no valid complaint here either.
Finally, the pay slips provided to our workers comply with the statutory requirements. We are required to do no more.
On that basis we are not prepared to negotiate with you in respect of these issues and we are fully prepared to embrace any strike action you wish to pursue. As a Trade Union you are not recognised and have no bargaining, negotiation or consultations rights.
I am sure that you recognise your members will not be paid by us for the days they engage in any strike action. As we are not prepared to accept your demands or negotiate with you, then your strike action will be of no use to your members.
At this moment we do not consider that a trade dispute has arisen and therefore any strike action by your members will be unlawful and they will not attract statutory immunity. The correspondence you sent to our operations team in January 2016, does not have your members support. There is simply no evidence of this.
The attached list of signatures is nothing more than that (a list). There is no reference in that list to those signatures being in support of the letter sent. Therefore, we do not accept that the definition of a trade dispute has been met.
In addition the Trade Union will not be entitled to rely on statutory immunity either. Therefore, any strike action in the absence of a trade dispute will result in legal action against your member and the Union. We would also be entitled to dismiss any employee that strikes unlawfully.
We also note that your notice to ballot referred to the 1992 Act. We assume that you are aware of the recently implemented Trade Union Act 2016 and the balloting requirements contained within it.
It is unfortunate that this matter can not be resolved. However, the business intend to take a firm stance on this matter.
I will inform ACAS that conciliation is no longer an option.
Kind regards
Tanya Vittorio | Group Employee Relations Consultant, Cordant Group
and Jason Moyer-Lee’s reply of Monday 13 March 2017:
Dear Ms. Vittorio,
Thank you for your email which I have read with with a mixture of amusement and absolute bewilderment. I would love to keep this reply short and snappy, however as you have managed to cram so much absurdity into your 13 paragraphs, I do fear I will struggle to be pithy in my response.
I am glad to see in your letter that your operation team has “discussed matters with the University of London (UOL)”. This clarifies for me, lest I had any doubt, that the various unlawful threats you go on to make about suing the union and dismissing workers is on behalf of and with the consent of the University of London.
As you know, the pay dispute over which we are currently balloting security guards arises because in 2011 the University of London made a promise to maintain their differentials with other outsourced workers as part of the London Living Wage implementation. The University has of course failed to do this and security guards as a result have seen smaller and smaller pay rises each year as compared to other outsourced workers. The beauty of outsourcing from the perspective of the unethical employer is that it allows a presumably reputable institution like the University of London to contract an incompetent middle-man company like yours to effectively manage relations with UoL workers on the University’s behalf. Despite the fact that the University paid for the London Living Wage uplift, negotiated the implementation, and the dispute regards UoL security guards, you appear to be saying that the UoL’s promise is worthless because UoL is not technically the employer. Whilst that may be the case legally, morally it is absurd.
You then go on to dispute that any of your workers are on 0-hours contracts, by implication drawing an important distinction between a 0-hours contract and a less-than-one-hour-per-day contract where all of the other hours routinely worked are on a 0-hours basis. Indeed this is precisely the sort of contract you appear to be giving security guards (see attached by way of example). To be clear, if a security guard has a guarantee of 336 hours in an entire year, to be allocated entirely at your discretion, yet they routinely work more hours than this, for all intents and purposes it is a 0 hours contract. The person has no stability, will struggle to get a mortgage, and is unable to financially plan with any degree of certainty. The fact that you somehow claim this is different because he is guaranteed on average less than one hour per day is preposterous. Also, the attached letter indicates you are not offering all security guards their entitlement to the enhanced holiday and sick pay to which they are legally entitled. I expect that to be rectified immediately, not least because this issue has already been raised before. As convenient as you may find it to have someone consistently check your work, we have a union to run and cannot spend all of our time trying to correct Cordant’s pervasive incompetence.
Thank you for reminding me that the workers will not be paid for their strike action- very helpful. And thanks as well for the heads up that in your opinion the strike will serve no purpose. I’m afraid I’m going to have to beg to differ. You see after a few days of the University being entirely shut down because there are no security guards or receptionists, and the halls of residence unable to function for the same reason, something tells me UoL will send its lackeys (that’s you guys) to negotiate.
Incredibly, you assert in your letter that you do not consider there to be a trade dispute and as such you may take legal action against the IWGB or the workers and you may dismiss the workers. Here you appear to be dreadfully confused. The definition of a trade dispute, according to s218 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992 is:
“…a dispute between employers and workers, or between workers and workers, which is connected with one or more of the following matters-” Included in the list of following matters is “terms and conditions of employment”. And further down in the section it states: “A dispute to which a trade union or employer’s association is a party shall be treated for the purposes of this Part as a dispute to which workers or, as the case may be, employers are parties.” In other words, if we are in dispute with you, then the workers we represent are in dispute. Maybe take a minute to just pause and digest that.
You then go on to point out that the Trade Union Act 2016 has come into force and imply that we were unaware of this as our letter referred to the Trade Union and Labour Relations (Consolidation) Act 1992. That’s because the effect of the Trade Union Act 2016 was to amend the existing legislation. As such the relevant law is the 1992 Act. So to answer your question, yes we are aware of the impact of the Trade Union Act 2016. It appears maybe you are not.
You close by stating that Cordant is going to “take a firm stance on this matter.”
In trying to analyse the incredible amount of absolute nonsense contained in your email, I am able to come up with two theories. Either 1) despite being the in-house legal person you are so incredibly unaware of the relevant laws that the analogy of a doctor not knowing what paracetamol is comes to mind; or 2) you are aware of the relevant legislation and are purposely writing factually inaccurate emails in order to try and intimidate your workers out of strike action. If theory 1 is correct I’m afraid I don’t have too much to say but I would recommend Cordant and the UoL have a little chat with you about the basics of employment law. If theory 2 is correct we will pursue you in an employment tribunal. My guess is your response to this email will probably tip the balance in favour of one of the two theories.
Regardless of what the explanation for your ridiculous email is, let me take this opportunity to make abundantly clear what our position is. Unless Cordant/UoL engage in meaningful negotiations and make a suitable offer on pay that our members accept, the ballot for industrial action will continue. And any strike will shut down the basic functioning of the University. If Cordant makes one more mention of the possibility of dismissing our members, or even issues so much as a verbal warning, we will pursue you to the full extent of the law. There is nothing we treat with more seriousness than the legal rights of our members and if you think you can act as though the law doesn’t apply to you without consequence, I strongly suggest you think again.
Once again, thanks very much for your email.
Kind regards,
Dr. Jason Moyer-Lee, General Secretary, IWGB
Independent Workers Union of Great Britain - Universities of London Branch 