Amazon workers in the UK are staging a strike over four days in November, including Black Friday, as they seek higher wages and safer working conditions. The GMB Union, which represents Amazon workers announced the strike on Monday, demanding that the company “urgently reconsider its priorities,” and saying the planned pay rise for UK employees as “little comfort to the thousands of Amazon workers facing poverty pay, unsafe working conditions and workplace surveillance,” The Guardian reported.
More than 1,000 workers will go on strike from Nov. 7 through Nov. 9 and then again on Black Friday. As tensions rise among warehouse workers who claim they aren’t adequately paid for the time they put in, Amazon has said it will increase the minimum pay for warehouse workers from £11 ($13.51) per hour to £11.80 ($14.50) and agreed to pay an additional £1 by the spring.
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Amazon contends that it is offering employees adequate benefits and denies workers have experienced harsh working conditions. “We have some of the most talented colleagues around, and we’re proud to offer them competitive wages and benefits, as well as fantastic opportunities for career development, all in a safe and modern work environment,” Amazon UK Country Manager John Boumphrey said in an emailed statement to Gizmodo.
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This is not the first time Amazon workers in the UK have protested against low wages and destitute working conditions, with another strike held on Black Friday in 2018. An Amazon spokesperson told Gizmodo in a similar statement at the time: “We provide safe and positive working conditions,” and encouraged anyone who doubts the truth of the statement “to come see for themselves…”—whatever that means.
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Rachel Fagan, a GMB organizer, said in a GMB Union press release that Amazon has not appealed to the needs of its employees, and said the move is necessary to get workers the benefits they need. “This is an unprecedented and historic moment with low-paid workers taking on one of the world’s most powerful corporations. This is our members’ response to the failure of Amazon bosses to listen,” she said. “As Black Friday looms, Amazon must urgently reconsider their priorities or risk strike action causing widespread disruption to customers and the public.”
The strike comes as a team of more than 60 Amazon drivers in San Bernadino and Palmdale, California have been on strike since July, alongside drivers in Michigan, Georgia, and other states that went on strike the previous month. The drivers are voicing similar demands over complaints of unfair labor practices at warehouses across the U.S.
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“Amazon doesn’t care about our safety, so we organized a union to keep ourselves safe,” Jarrid Long, an Amazon driver said in a Teamsters press release late last month. “I’ve been chased by dogs. I’ve been close to fainting from the heat in the vans. We are on strike to put an end to Amazon’s unfair labor practices, and more Amazon workers are joining the fight every day.”
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