News

Unite members, who are in their 20th week of dispute, at Wyndeham Impact, Basingstoke will be mounting a further picket outside their company tomorrow (Friday, 16 September) and will be joined by Unite assistant general secretary, Tony Burke and other Unite print union reps who will be showing their solidarity with their fellow print workers.

The dispute is over defence of their jobs and significant changes to their terms and conditions - some workers gave up as much as £85 a week, to help the company when the economic crisis first hit - and were expecting this to be made good. Instead they have endured wage freezes and compulsory redundancy.

Unite members have taken part in weekly four hour stoppages on Friday's since April 2011 - this now increase daily two hour stoppages on Monday 19 September. This week they took their fight to the TUC leafleting delegates to explain the dispute.

Unite assistant general secretary, Tony Burke, said: “These workers who have made a massive sacrifice to their pay to support the company feel totally let down by the management. We will not stand by and let Wyndeham Impact now ride roughshod over our members pay, terms and conditions and benefits and will do everything we can to support the workers during this very difficult time. We urge the management to do the right thing and honour their commitments.

"Wyndham Impact was caught up in the Icelandic banking crisis and workers tried to help them - this is how they were rewarded. This is why Unite warned members not to take pay cuts as some companies were clearly exploiting the crisis. We have evidence of where companies promised to make good pay cuts, but keep coming back for more!"

Steve Sibbald, Unite national officer, said: “Our members took a 13 percent pay cut, over a year ago, to help the company during a very difficult financial period. They now feel betrayed as they feel that this gesture of good will has done nothing to help their cause, but feel it has instead bolstered the company’s profits. They are demanding that the company pay these wages back to them.”

For further information contact Ashraf Choudhury in the Unite press office on             020 7420 8914       or 079820 224761.