BRING AGENCY WORKERS IN-HOUSE

RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: april 2013 :: RMTnews 19 R MT Black Ethnic and Minority (BEMAC) activists meeting in Glasgow called for a national campaign to defend agency workers sacked on London Underground. 33 agency workers were sacked in December last year after management got rid of the agency employing them after the workers had won equal pay under legislation. But LU terminated the contract of job agency Trainpeople, leaving the 33 – many of whom had worked for up to five years as agency staff –without a job. Following a major campaign by RMT under the banner of “sack the agency, not the workers,” an agreement was reached whereby the staff would be re-deployed and directly employed on London Underground. However many of the 33 have not been re-employed by LU after interviews by the company. Finsbury Park branch member Petrit Mihaj calling on the BEMAC to join the campaign. “We recruited this group of workers, organised them around new equal pay legislation for agency workers,” he said. “The company then decided to get rid of them by sacking the agency. “Our slogan – sack the agency not the workers is to say, we want them back in house,” he said. Young member Leon Brumant told delegates that the “Justice for the 33”campaign was what had inspired him to become active within the union. “LU has used these workers as a testing ground for their unsavoury policies, it’s all part of this zero hours contract culture they want to introduce. “They would love to have these zero-hours contracts for everyone,” he said. One of the 33 sacked agency workers Alexis Bailey received an ovation after spelling out her pride in her job and the consequences of losing it, adding that she thanked the union for its support to her. “This is not just a job for me, it is my life and I have been evicted from where I was living,” she said. Other policies adopted by the conference included support for BME pensioners who originate from outside the EU and condemnation of the media for fanning Islamaphobia. General secretary Bob Crow highlighted the class-based nature of the attacks on welfare, workers rights’ and massive increases in fees for taking tribunal cases, which the union has pledged to cover. “While there is discrimination is happening, this committee is essential to this union and essential to the trade union movement to give advice to the executive committee on how we can eradicate discrimination against black and ethnic members. “The government want to create massive unemployment and the employer can sit back with an abundance of labour and keeping the anti-trade union laws in place which stop workers fighting back,” he said. He praised union activists for increasing membership by two per cent and wage increases for many workers but added that there was more to do. “The activists are the ones that hold the union together and we want more activists to get every workplace a trade union representative,” he said. The expanded Doncaster education centre which the union has just opened “will put 1,000 representatives through this year, providing trained reps at a time when other trade unions are shutting down education centres,” he said. He said that unions needed to reach out to the community to form wider alliances to welfare cuts. “Trade unions can’t be seen just as a job club, that the only thing they do is look after people at work. “It’s no good winning a wage increase when you go home if your daughter can’t get a house if she falls pregnant or your mum can’t get into an old peoples home.” “Where the community defend a school, an old peoples home or another part of the welfare state, RMT has got to be seen in the middle, side by side with people fighting for those services,” he said. BRING AGENCY WORKERS IN-HOUSE