U.K.
Members of UNISON working at the School for Oriental and African Studies (SOAS) in central London have secured improvements in pensions, leave and sick leave following strike action. The workers, employed as cleaners by the ISS multinational, argued that they should have the same benefits as staff directly employed by SOAS but initially ISS refused to improve what were minimum legal standards.
Read more at > UNISON
Services union ver.di was finally able to negotiate a new pay agreement with the Vivantes Service company in Berlin after 51 days of strike action. Vivantes Service is part of the Vivantes network of municipal health institutions providing care across the city. The three-year deal provides for increases of 2.1% in 2018, 2.1% in 2019 and 3.5% in 2010. However, in both 2018 and 2019 there are additional increases for the two lowest pay grades meaning that pay for the lowest paid will increase by up to 4% in 2018 and by between 3.2% and 3.5% in 2019. Ver.di's aim is to bring pay and conditions in
The SSP/VPÖD public services union has organized a demonstration on 2 September in support of the ISS cleaning employees who work at Geneva airport and who have been on strike for over seven weeks. The union is calling for ISS to apply the collective agreement in force at the Swissport company that subcontracted the cleaning. ISS has imposed individual contracts on the workers that means they are between €175 and €1000 a month worse off depending on their length of service. Read more at > SSP/VPÖD (FR)
The long strike by sections of public sector workers across Germany has achieved an initial success in getting the regional employers back to the negotiating table. Talks are set to resume on 18 May but the union plans to keep up the pressure until then. Members are being encouraged to support continuing strike action and any other campaigning initiatives to ensure that their message gets across - no to longer working hours. EPSU and its Belgian affiliates organised a solidarity vigil on 17 May outside the Brussels offices of the Lower Saxony region. Hartmut Mollring, the region's finance
