Transport, logistics, lawyers … The country has known its most important wave of strikes in decades.
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The anger ended up overflowing on Wednesday August 3, in the Amazon warehouse in Tilbury, east of London, when management announced the offer made to employees: 35 pence (41 cents of Euro) Additional for basic handlers, bringing their salary to 11.45 pounds (13.55 euros) per hour. Or 3 % increase, while inflation in the United Kingdom reached 9.4 % in June.
This news aroused the stir in the corporate canteen. Videos posted on social networks show frames trying to appease the ambient wrath. In vain. A large part of the employees refused to return to their post, which disturbed the operation of the warehouse for forty-eight hours. The tension has spread and wild strikes briefly reached the sites of Coventry and Bristol.
“People are in such tense financial situations … I see so much despair, explains Steve Garelick, representative of the GMB Syndicate, who follows the situation there. So when we offer 35 pence, of course they are angry. “He delivered a letter to the British siege of the e-commerce giant claiming to increase the basic wages to 15 pounds per hour. Amazon replies that it “increased wages to a minimum between 10.50 pounds and 11.45 pounds per hour, depending on the premises, which represents an increase of 29 % since 2018”.
The case of Amazon is symptomatic of a movement of social dissatisfaction as wide as it is noted across the Channel. Saturday August 13, nine train companies – most of the British trains – will be on strike. It is the fourth time since June 20 that the rail system has been immobilized, two unions alternating debraying. These also took place in the buses, the London metro, certain universities, pubs, as well as BT (formerly British Telecom).
Even lawyers have protested since the end of June, strike every other week, in order to obtain an increase in fees for the files committed of automatic. “It is the summer of dissatisfaction,” said Garelick, a term that echoes the winter of dissatisfaction in 1979, when the country was paralyzed due to work stoppages both in factories and on the side garbage collectors or gravediggers.
“The unions were kneeling”
This is only the beginning. Factors and dockers have announced strikes for August. Tuesday, August 9, the Royal College of Nursing, the nursing union, has, for the first time in its more than a hundred -year -old history, recommended that its members stop work, as part of a movement that should take place in October . National education also prepares social actions in the fall.
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