ABM Cleaners

RAIL UNION RMT announced today that cleaners working for the Carlisle Group on their Eurostar contract will strike forty eight hours next week in a long-running dispute on a range on pay, conditions and bullying issues. RMT members voted 100% for action.

The strike will run from 21.59 hours on Thursday 17th September to 21.59 hours on Saturday 19th September.

The issues at the heart of the strike action are:

* A failure by the company to make any offer of a pay increase for 2009 and an underhand attempt to push back the pay settlement date by nine months into 2010.

LONDON MAYOR Boris Johnson will come under renewed pressure at Mayor’s Questions today (Wednesday September 9) over his failure to ensure that cleaners working for contractors on London Underground receive the London Living Wage that they are entitled to.

The issue will be raised today by Labour GLA Leader Val Shawcross as part of an on-going campaign by tube union RMT to get the cleaners the London Living Wage that they deserve.

The following article has been published in the PCS (civil service trade union) activists' magazine. PCS is interested in working to unionise cleaners, and believes that it can learn from our efforts with London Underground cleaners.

London calling: the divided city

A living wage campaign for Underground cleaners continues despite successes last year, says RMT London Transport regional council secretary Janine Booth

Following the resolution passed by our Regional Council in March, the union's General Grades Committee (part of the national executive) made the following decision on June 1st. The latest report is that "work is in progress".

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That we note the resolution from the LT Regional Council and the continuing sackings of our cleaner members and the need to build up our membership in this important grade.

We also take into consideration the recent meeting with our Parliamentary Group, which is placed on file.

The General Secretary is therefore instructed:

I met with I.S.S. management on Thursday 13th August to discuss the £550,000 savings that Metronet wish them to make.

1. I.S.S. guaranteed that no I.S.S employees would be made redundant. All redundancies would come from agency staff.

2. Where possible existing I.S.S. staff would be used to cover all the needed positions in workplaces.

This resolution, submitted by Jubilee South and East London Line branch, was passed at the August Regional Council meeting.

This Branch/Regional Council is appalled, but not surprised, by the recent comments made by the Mayor of London, Boris Johnson, that his payment of £250k, for writing a Sunday newspaper column, was nothing more than ‘chicken feed’.

We feel this is a disgrace, considering the Mayor’s actions in intervening in the current LUL pay dispute, and also the failure to pay cleaners the London living wage.

On Wednesday 17 June, RMT protested outside Mayor's Question Time against Tube cleaners' poverty pay. Protesters demanded that Mayor Boris Johnson keep his promise that everyone working for the GLA or in its areas of responsibility would receive the London Living Wage, recently uprated to £7.60 an hour.

The RMT has been advised that Jenny Jones AM pressed Boris Johnson on Wednesday at Mayor’s Question Time that TfL should meet with Tubelines and RMT on the London Living Wage.

He reportedly responded that there were 50 cleaners who were not in receipt of the London Living Wage but that has now been resolved satisfactorily.

RMT tube workers will be taking a protest to Mayor Boris Johnson’s question time this Wednesday – 17th June – over his broken promises on the London Living Wage for some tube cleaners and over the docking of pay for staff who could not get into work on the snow day in February.