BT and Openreach employees from the Communication Workers Union (CWU) walked out on strike again yesterday in a dispute over pay.
The striking workers picketed Paisley TEC, in Clark Street, as tens of thousands of workers across the UK joined them in their second day of industrial action in a week.
The CWU say the strike is the result of the real terms wage cut from bosses, saying some members are reliant on food banks to get by.
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The first day of strike action last Friday (July 29) began hours after the release of the company's latest quarterly results which showed £400m profit in the first quarter, on top of the £1.3bn achieved in the last financial year.
In March BT offered workers a pay rise of 4.8 per cent, but with inflation currently over nine per cent, that offer represents a real terms pay cut of more than four per cent.
Around 30,000 engineers and 9,000 call centre workers voted in favour of the strike action. Their jobs see them work on the physical infrastructure to maintain our access to the internet and assist those who are having problems with their access.
Meanwhile, BT CEO Phillip Jansen’s share of the pie increased by 31.6 per cent from £2,628,000 in 2021 to £3,460,000 in the year to March 2022.
Speaking from a picket line on Friday, Dave Ward, the CWU’s general secretary said: ““There needs to be some kind of enquiry into the action of these people who are ripping off the whole of society.
“Our members are feeling disgusted at the actions of this CEO and the BT Group Board and they are not going to put up with it anymore.”
He continued: ““We cannot carry on letting them live in a parallel galaxy, let alone a parallel universe – treating their workers the way they are.
“Yesterday these guys announced a £400 million first quarter profit on top of the recently announced £1.3 billion – and that that they are again going to put prices up which will amount to a 23% price increase for customers in 12 months.
“I don’t think anyone could accept that as reasonable – and I’d urge the Government to launch an enquiry into the way BT management is running this company.”
A BT Group spokesperson said: “At the start of this year, we were in exhaustive discussions with the CWU that lasted for two months, trying hard to reach an agreement on pay. When it became clear that we were not going to reach an accord, we took the decision to go ahead with awarding our team member and frontline colleagues the highest pay award in more than 20 years, effective 1st April.
“We have confirmed to the CWU that we won’t be re-opening the 2022 pay review, having already made the best award we could. We’re balancing the complex and competing demands of our stakeholders and that includes making once-in-a-generation investments to upgrade the country’s broadband and mobile networks, vital for the UK economy and for BT Group’s future – including our people.”
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