Unite will make school support staff campaign for a pay and grading review an election issue

Posted on May 23, 2024 by Unite the union NI

Unite leader Sharon Graham visits Northern Ireland school support workers’ picket lines and vows to escalate campaign for improved pay and equality

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham committed her union to make an election issue of the campaign of school support workers to secure a six-year overdue pay and grading review after visiting striking education workers on the picket lines outside Mitchell House school in east Belfast yesterday.

1,500 members of Unite working as school support staff for the education authority were undertaking their third day of strike action.

The pay and grading review was instructed for implementation by the national joint council pay body in 2018 but which has been left unfunded in both February’s public pay package and the draft executive budget for 2024-25.

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Duggan Brothers’ non-compliance on OPW project raised in Dail

Posted on May 21, 2024 by unitetheunion

Pension contributions not paid for up to half of workers on taxpayer funded Leeson Lane project

Unite writes to OPW Minister O’Donnell seeking audit of Duggan sites

The failure by contractor Duggan Brothers to make contributions to the Construction Workers’ Pension Scheme or equivalent scheme on a publicly-funded project was raised in the Dail today (Tuesday) by Deputy Mick Barry. During Taoiseach’s questions, Deputy Barry highlighted Duggan Brothers’ non-compliance on an Office of Public Works (OPW) project in Dublin’s Leeson Lane.

Members contacted Unite some weeks ago to raise concerns regarding non-compliance on the site. Unite spoke with workers employed on the project and estimates that contributions have not been paid in respect of up to half those working on the taxpayer-funded project. Duggan Brothers’ failure to make CWPS or equivalent contributions could impact workers’ future pension and sick pay entitlements.

Duggan Brothers has refused to engage with Unite regarding its concerns, and has continuously frustrated its attempts to access the project to engage with workers on site.

Duggan Brothers has an ongoing relationship with the OPW, having been the main contractor on the Leinster House renovation and conservation project in 2021 and the deep retrofit of Tom Johnson House unveiled last week.

Unite’s Irish Secretary Susan Fitzgerald has written to OPW Minister Kieran O’Donnell highlighting the union’s concerns and asking that the OPW conduct a compliance audit of the Leeson Lane site and any other OPW sites where Duggan Brothers is the main contractor. Unite has also identified concerns regarding the possible mis-classification of workers’ employment status, and has asked that the OPW involve the department of social protection’s SCOPE section in any audit of Duggan sites.

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Northern Ireland school support workers begin strikes over pay and grading

Posted on May 19, 2024 by Unite the union NI
Protesting Education workers at Stormont demanding pay and grading review

Workers’ presence at Stormont to demand MLAs refuse to support any budget that does not deliver a pay and grading review 

After six years of failure to implement the review and a staffing crisis, education workers have had enough

Over a thousand Unite the union members employed as school support workers will be taking the first of three days strike action tomorrow (Monday 20 May). Strike action is due to commence from 00.01 (Monday) and continue until 23.59 on Wednesday 22 May. Employers have been notified of two further strike dates in June (3 and 4).

The strikes are being coordinated with NIPSA and GMB who will also be striking from tomorrow and Unison who continue to take action short of strike. The strike is likely to result in considerable disruption to schools across Northern Ireland.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “School support workers in Northern Ireland have been left behind – they are underpaid, suffering a staffing crisis and the equality issues at the root of the pay and grading review remain unaddressed.

“Our members working as school support workers have the full and continued backing of Unite in their fight to secure implementation of this long overdue review.”

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University Hospital Waterford: Support staff take action in pay justice dispute

Posted on May 16, 2024 by unitetheunion

Dispute centres on HSE failure to upgrade laundry workers, and to recognise long serving support staff

Unite accuses HSE of leaving hospital and union in the dark over regrading plans

Trade union Unite, which represents support staff at the University Hospital Waterford (UHW), today (Thursday) announced that over 100 members working in the laundry, catering and portering departments will be engaging in a work-to-rule from Monday 27 May.

Members voted to take industrial action following the failure by the Health Services Executive (HSE) to include laundry staff in a regrading scheme, leaving them financially worse off. Laundry staff have historically been aligned with catering and portering staff.

In addition to the failure to include laundry workers in the regrading scheme, some upgraded staff were awarded incremental credits when calculating their new pay rates. However, the seemingly arbitrary exclusion of portering and catering workers from incremental credits means that long serving workers in these grades are required to work up their increments – again resulting in a financial loss for the workers concerned.

Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Support staff keep our hospitals running. These essential workers do some of the hardest jobs for the lowest wages in our health service, and it beggars belief that they have been sidelined in the HSE’s regrading scheme.

“Unite always prioritises the jobs, pay and conditions of its members and the workers at Waterford Hospital will receive Unite’s complete support.”

Neither University Hospital Waterford nor Unite were consulted by the HSE regarding the parameters of the regrading scheme.

Unite will be available to engage with UHW during the industrial action as required by the relevant disputes procedures.

Unite regional officer Eoin Drummey added: “The HSE’s shambolic implementation of this deeply flawed regrading scheme means that laundry, portering and catering workers will suffer an unjust financial penalty – not just because of the failure to upgrade laundry workers, but because long-serving portering and catering workers are required to work up their increments. This again means a financial loss for the workers concerned“.

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School support staff at Education Authority to take strike action

Posted on May 14, 2024 by Unite the union NI

School support staff to recommence strike action after Stormont fails to fund six-year overdue pay and grading review

Some school workers are paid less than the national minimum wage when their pay is calculated over 12 months

Unite the union has informed the Education Authority of upcoming strike action to be taken by school support workers. The strike will commence at 00.01 on Monday 20 May and continue for three days until 23.59 on Wednesday 22 May; with further strike days planned in June. The strike will involve more than one thousand special educational needs assistants, classroom assistants, bus drivers, bus escorts, catering, cooks, admin and other school support staff.

School support staff are among the lowest paid workers in the education sector, a situation made worse by the fact that they are only paid during term-time. Averaging their pay over twelve months, school bus drivers and classroom assistants are paid only £11.79 an hour; school cooks only £11.36 and special educational needs school bus escorts £11.17 – significantly less than the current national minimum wage of £11.44. 

The national joint council instructed a pay and grading review be conducted by the education authority in 2018 to address low-pay and outstanding equality issues. Despite intermittent strike action by Unite the union members and protests by parents over the last two years nothing has been done to implement it. More recently and despite a request for funding by the department of education to the department for finance, no funding provision for the review was made in either February’s public sector package or in last month’s draft Executive budget.

Sharon Graham, Unite general secretary, expressed her ongoing support for the school support staff.

“If you average what these term-time workers are paid over 12 months, some receive less than the bare legal minimum. These workers are not paid by a gangmaster or dodgy fly-by-night boss, they are public sector workers. This is an unacceptable situation which is resulting in a recruitment and retention crisis and mounting pressures on the workforce. They cannot take any more.

“Disgracefully the failure of politicians in Stormont and Westminster has left school support staff with no alternative but to return to the picket line to secure the six-year overdue pay and grading review. They can count on the continued support of Unite in their fight to win the pay and grading improvement that they are promised.”

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