OCS in UNISON - North West

Tomorrow is #OneTeamDay when we celebrate the whole NHS team and highlight the work and contributions of support staff in the NHS #OneTeamNHS 💙

🚨 UNISON WIN! 🎉 Fantastic win by Mitie staff at Dudley Group hospitals! More than 300 hospital workers will now get the Covid payment they are due. ✊💜 @unisonwestmids

Women have always been central to trade unions and the fight for a more equal society. Celebrating women's achievements on #InternationalWomensDay #IWD2024 💜 #InspireInclusion 🫶

On International Women’s Day we celebrate women's achievement and all global activism committed to forging equality #IWD2024 💜 We are a union of over a million women members in the UK, through our collective efforts we aim to support and #InspireInclusion 🫶

🚨UNISON WIN!! Amazing win by hospital workers employed by Sodexo. All private firms should be on notice that their staff deserve the same pay and conditions as their NHS colleagues that they work alongside. #OneTeamNHS

Mitie must pay healthcare workers what they are owed or strikes will continue, say UNISON and Unite @Mitie chief executive Phil Bentley must pay healthcare workers in the West Midlands the lump sum they are owed. The general secretaries of the UK’s two largest unions have written to Mr Bentley to say strikes planned for today from 5am and next Friday 8 March will go ahead unless hospital staff get a one-off £1,655 payment that other NHS staff have already received. Cleaners, porters and catering employees are among around 370 workers set to strike again following action which began with Unite in December. All are contracted by Mitie to work at three hospitals run by The Dudley Group NHS Foundation Trust and are among the lowest-paid staff in the NHS. The letter to Mr Bentley says that the £1,655 lump sum was part of the deal agreed by the government and health unions last year following strikes in the NHS. The one-off payment has already been awarded to “hundreds of thousands of NHS employees”. The letter says many of the staff “worked, alongside their NHS colleagues, throughout the Covid pandemic”, and that Mitie is “treating them unfairly and forcing them into hardship” by withholding the money. UNISON and Unite say the company claims the extra payment is unaffordable. The letter adds: “If that is the case, then we struggle to see how Mitie could pay the £5.9m remuneration package you (Mr Bentley) received last year, or your annual bonus. “Mitie can easily afford to pay the lump sum. Its profits were generated from the hard work and dedication of low-paid employees. They (the staff) put their own health at risk and that of their families for no additional reward.” Mitie is attempting to break the strikes by bussing in staff represented by the Prison Officers’ Association from other NHS sites, which the unions say is "despicable". UNISON general secretary Christina McAnea @cmcanea: “Health staff would rather be back at work than on the picket line. But Mitie has forced them into taking strike action. “The company says it hasn’t got the money to pay this lump sum. Yet it can find the cash to spend on bringing in strike-breaking workers from sites miles away. “Mitie must do what’s right and pay up now or the strikes will continue.” Unite general secretary Sharon Graham: “It is shameful that these vital workers who keep the NHS going are being kicked in the teeth by their employer. Mitie is a multi-million-pound company which announced huge profits last year. It can easily afford to pay them the money they are owed. “Instead, Mitie has dragged its feet every step of the way and forced some of the lowest-paid workers in the NHS onto the picket line in their fight for fair pay. They will have Unite’s full backing.”