Weekly shifts of up to 60 hours for barely the minimum wage, broken feet and backs and a shortage of bathrooms in a huge facility are some of the complaints from Amazon workers in the English city of Coventry, who are holding the biggest strike against the giant in the United Kingdom.
After their first and historic strike on January 25, a group of almost 500 employees affiliated with the GMB union has turned up the pressure with another measure of force from Monday to Friday, in protest of their wages and working conditions that they consider abusive.
In the midst of a snowfall that eventually gave way to the sun, the strikers participated in a picket line this Tuesday morning, with which they managed to stop the entry of several company trucks with merchandise. In the afternoon, they will be replaced by those from the night shift, in a pattern that it will be repeated every five days.
While some of them try to persuade colleagues who come to work to join the strike, others warm up around a campfire or drink hot tea courtesy of GMB.
The fight for union recognition
“From the beginning of the dispute, we have multiplied the number of members (unionized) in this distribution center,” one of the largest in the country, with the size of eight football fields, union spokesman Tom Rigby told EFE.
Rigby explains that, in addition to asking for an increase from 10.5 pounds (11.8 euros) per hour to 15 pounds (17 euros), the goal is to recruit more than half of the plant’s staff – 2,000 people according to management, although the number is disputed – to force Amazon by law to accept union representation and collective bargaining.
In April 2022, a warehouse of the American multinational in New York became the first to obtain this recognition in the United States, in what was considered a victory for the workers over the company, Known for her anti-union position.
stress and disease
Emilia Gradinaru, a 47-year-old Romanian who has worked at the Coventry center since it opened in 2018, is one of many employees who complain about the damage caused by “safety footwear” they are required to use.
In addition to feet full of hardness, experience constant back pain, due to the weight she must carry without being able to sit down during her 10-hour shift. She is one of those who works 60 hours a week, instead of 40, to be able to survive in the face of the rising cost of living.
“We are people, not robots”he tells EFE, echoing one of the slogans of the strike, to explain the constant control and reprimands to which they are subjected by their superiors.
“They always ask us to give more, it is never enough. I’m losing my health and I don’t see the light of day,” adds Justyna Nowak, a 35-year-old from Poland.
Faced with widespread condemnation of excessive targets, an Amazon spokesperson told EFE that “performance metrics are regularly evaluated and benchmarked against actual performance history of employees.”
“We look at their performance and then we set that measure, always with safety in mind,” he explained.
Another of the most common complaints among strikers is insufficient bathrooms in facilities with more than 14 kilometers of conveyor belts, which in some cases has led, according to what they say, to urinate in bottles.
The company says instead that “all employees have easy access to sanitary facilities, which are within walking distance of their workplace, and They can use the bathroom when necessary.
Several workers told EFE incidents of injuries and health problems, including miscarriages and faintingin which the management was reluctant to call an ambulance, presumably so as not to tarnish their image.
“I have two knee prostheses and one day I hurt myself and couldn’t move. Instead of taking me to the emergency hospital, They made me call my husband to come pick me up.“, says Marie Connelly, 57 years old.
The Amazon spokesman said for his part that “keeping our employees safe is the number one priority and the most important thing we do.”
“We work closely with health and safety experts, conduct thousands of inspections of our buildings, and actively seek public input on how we can improve your well-being at work“, he declared.
Whether due to a lack of will or communication, it seems that the employees demonstrating this week outside the Coventry plant do not feel heard.
EFE Agency
PB