NO TO AGENCY CONTRACTS AT TRANSPORT FOR LONDON

L ast month RMT members in Transport for London No1 Branch struck over intolerable attacks against pay and pensions. Brothers and sisters at TfL’s Pier Walk contact centre, the lost property office, several travel information centres, as well as other offices in London, took two days of strike action against the company’s attempts at a pay freeze that would have hit hard against final salary pensions. This is still an on- going battle. However it is not the only threat these workers are facing. TfL bosses have increasingly been hiring agency staff on insecure contracts, undermining union membership and working conditions. The contact centre helplines are now staffed by a majority of agency workers on zero-hour contracts in a total workforce of around 200. Travel information centres now employ nearly one in four agency staff. NO PROTECTION TfL hires from at least six separate agencies. These staff are not on zero hour contracts, however, they can be sacked (know euphemistically as being ‘released’) at short notice and without recourse to the normal warnings and procedures. This means that most are afraid to ask for basic legal rights and fear retribution if they dare to join a trade union. Not only this, but TfL plays fast and loose with the 2010 Agency Worker Regulations. The AWR states that agency workers have the right to equal treatment regarding working time entitlements, including duration of working time. Despite this TfL bosses have demanded that agency workers work an additional mandatory five hours a week above the hours of permanent staff. These extra hours are often cancelled or reinstated at a few hours notice with no regard to family or childcare considerations. TfL bosses continue to deny any responsibility for this, insisting that agency workers are “not our staff”, despite having set the working hours. It is ironic that labour laws passed by the government are not complied with by a government- run company. Equal pay for equal work? Trade unions have long upheld the slogan ‘Equal pay for equal work’. These days we also need to say “equal contracts”. Equal rights on paper count for nothing if you can’t ask for them without getting sacked. A two tier work force is not acceptable in any modern workplace, especially when many agency workers have been doing the same jobs as permanent colleagues for sometimes four or five years. Casualisation also allows worse agency conditions to creep into the permanent jobs in terms of increased targets and poorer working conditions. The union says: ‘Sack the agencies, not the workers’. TfL must offer permanent contracts to all long- term agency workers. AGENCY WORKERS JOIN RMT! Agency workers need to join RMT helpline 0800 376 3706 :: march 2014 :: RMTnews 10 NO TO AGENCY CONTRACTS AT TRANSPORT FOR LONDON RMT London regional organiser John Leach reveals how Transport for London is attacking jobs, conditions and the union