'Robots Are Treated Better': Amazon Warehouse Workers Stage First-Ever Strike In the UK (cnbc.com) 68
Hundreds of Amazon workers are on strike in Britain. The walkout marks the first formal industrial action in the country for the U.S. tech giant. CNBC reports: The 24-hour strike action began Wednesday a minute after midnight. Strikers are expected to picket outside the company's site in Coventry in central England throughout the day. At 6 a.m. London time, workers were pictured camping by a bonfire and waving union flags outside the Coventry site near Birmingham airport, known as BHX4. One poster behind the workers had a slogan that said "Fight for 15 pounds," and encouraged workers to join the GMB union. Another, which was bannered across a fence, read: "The wrong Amazon is burning."
The GMB Union, which represents the workers involved, said it expects 300 employees out of a total 1,000 at the plant to turn up to the walkout. Workers are planning to hold a larger scale demonstration from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. London time. Staff are unhappy with a pay increase of 50 pence (56 U.S. cents) per hour, equivalent to 5% and well below inflation. Amazon introduced the pay hike last summer. But warehouse workers say it fails to match the rising cost of living. They want the company to pay a minimum 15 pounds an hour. They also want better working conditions. Amazon workers have raised concerns about long working hours, high injury rates, and the unrelenting pace of work, as well as aggressive, tech-enhanced monitoring of employees. "We all saw the profits they're making during the pandemic -- that's what angered people more," said Darren Westwood, one of Amazon's warehouse workers taking part in the strike. "We were expecting a better increase than what they were imposing."
"Someone the other day said we're treated like robots -- no, robots are treated better," Westwood told CNBC.
Further reading: Amazon To Layoff Over 18,000 Employees
The GMB Union, which represents the workers involved, said it expects 300 employees out of a total 1,000 at the plant to turn up to the walkout. Workers are planning to hold a larger scale demonstration from 4 p.m. to 8 p.m. London time. Staff are unhappy with a pay increase of 50 pence (56 U.S. cents) per hour, equivalent to 5% and well below inflation. Amazon introduced the pay hike last summer. But warehouse workers say it fails to match the rising cost of living. They want the company to pay a minimum 15 pounds an hour. They also want better working conditions. Amazon workers have raised concerns about long working hours, high injury rates, and the unrelenting pace of work, as well as aggressive, tech-enhanced monitoring of employees. "We all saw the profits they're making during the pandemic -- that's what angered people more," said Darren Westwood, one of Amazon's warehouse workers taking part in the strike. "We were expecting a better increase than what they were imposing."
"Someone the other day said we're treated like robots -- no, robots are treated better," Westwood told CNBC.
Further reading: Amazon To Layoff Over 18,000 Employees
"Hundreds" (Score:3, Interesting)
Amazon employs over 75,000 people in the UK, most of those in the warehouse. I do not think they are concerned with "hundreds" going on "strike". They will all be replaced by the end of the week.
H-1B for warehouse? keep up that rate or be deport (Score:2)
H-1B for warehouse? keep up that rate or be deported!
Re:H-1B for warehouse? keep up that rate or be dep (Score:4, Funny)
Re: "Hundreds" (Score:3)
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There was a case some years ago of a secret blacklist in the construction industry in the UK. The people on it got significant compensation.
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You've gotta start somewhere.
Re:"Hundreds" (Score:4, Informative)
In the UK you can't be fired for going on strike, as long as the strike is legal. In this case it was legal, it was balloted and organized by the union.
If they are replaced by the end of the week, they will have unfair dismissal claims.
Remember that employment rights exist in Europe, even in the UK, for now.
Re: "Hundreds" (Score:2)
I never said they will be dismissed. They will be replaced. They can stay on strike forever, as it's irrelevant against a 75K workforce. Eventually they will run out of money and quit.
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They will all be replaced by the end of the week.
It's the UK, which despite having enjoyed a Conservative government for the last 12 years still has a few worker protections left.
It is also not unheard of for scabs to have the living shit kicked out of them, pour encourager les autres.
Re: "Hundreds" (Score:2)
100 people on strike is irrelevant to Amazon. It won't matter. They can stay on strike forever.
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Re: "Hundreds" (Score:2)
LOL, if true that makes it even less relevant, not more.
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Re:"Hundreds" (Score:5, Insightful)
Amazon has relentlessly and very possibly illegally attacked every attempted unionization that's happened. At a certain point you got to start questioning why they would do that if you unions weren't effective. They spend millions and millions of dollars on high priced legal firms who specialize in union busting. No business would spend that money that consistently if it didn't have a big payoff
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At a certain point you got to start questioning why they would do that if you unions weren't effective.
Sure, but the question is "effective at what?"
Extortion? Yeah, what a mystery that someone might be against that.
Higher wages (Score:2)
Also better working conditions, more consistent employment, and we had the strongest economy in our countries history when unions were at their strongest.
You're parroting talking points from Amazon. Do you think Jeff Bezos is a personal friend or something?
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I guarantee you they're very concerned about it. For one thing it's a warehouse and that means an entire area is not going to have anyone to deliver to it unless people are driving way out of their way. But the main thing is the pr and getting attention for unionization drives.
Amazon has relentlessly and very possibly illegally attacked every attempted unionization that's happened. At a certain point you got to start questioning why they would do that if you unions weren't effective. They spend millions and millions of dollars on high priced legal firms who specialize in union busting. No business would spend that money that consistently if it didn't have a big payoff
Worse yet, in the UK workers have *gasp* protections. Amazon can't simply fire someone for striking. It also sets a precedent, it can easily snowball from hundreds into thousands. Workers can sue for mistreatment, let alone wrongful dismissal in the UK.
As you've mentioned, it brings the public eye onto Amazon's operation and could end up with some quite dodgy, if not outright illegal things being published (Private Eye, I'm looking at you).
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Worse yet, in the UK workers have *gasp* protections. Amazon can't simply fire someone for striking.
It's the same in the US, despite what all the "Internet Lawyers" in this thread say. It does depend on if you're just striking for higher pay or if you're striking to protest unfair labor conditions. From https://www.nlrb.gov/strikes [nlrb.gov]:
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You, on the other hand, know *zilch* about the UK and unions. The public - gee, many of whom *are* members of other unions - do not appreciate scabs.
Wow (Score:2)
'Robots Are Treated Better': Amazon Warehouse Workers Stage First-Ever Strike In the UK
Incredible! There's never been a strike in the UK before?
Makes sense (Score:2)
Robots are more expensive and harder to replace.
Re: Robots more expensive & harder to replace (Score:1)
Every time I'm millimeters from kicking the living chips out of my bugass Wintel PC, I think of the replacement costs and hold myself back. (I know, Linux etc., let's not go there today.)
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I heard they even give the robots free snacks and more restroom breaks!
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Because no one wants to work next to a leaky robot.
Re: Makes sense (Score:2)
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Of course robots are treated better (Score:1, Troll)
When it comes to human beings somebody else made them and somebody else's responsible for them. And they're easily replaceable.
You are not special. There's not a company on the planet that sees you as irreplaceable. There's a very small number of geniuses who are genuinely irreplaceable for a specific purpose. If dealing with those geniuses is too cumbersome the money people will just move
"Robots are treated better" (Score:1)
Then try disguising self as a robot. [escapistmagazine.com]
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Rather than argue they'd just plug you into the wall and then say "but you said you were a robot" to your smoking face.
Let's get the obvious out of the way (Score:2)
You can't be treated worse (or better) than robots because robots are not "treated". They are maintained. They are robots.
Re:Let's get the obvious out of the way (Score:4, Insightful)
Re: Let's get the obvious out of the way (Score:2)
Good Start Would Be a Jumbotron In Each Warhouse (Score:3)
Then have a giant head of Jeff Bezos on it yelling at them extolling the virtues of grinding themselves to death working for Amazon, while they piss in bags attached to catheters in order to meet their quotas without leaving their work stations.
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Market Value (Score:1)
Re:Market Value (Score:5, Insightful)
Most union activity is meant to get worker pay closer to the value workers bring to the business, not the market rate of employee value. When there is an imbalance between what the employer makes and the employees make, union activity has a decent track record of reducing that imbalance. But like you said, if the only goal was to make market rates then it would be much easier to just get a new job.
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Most union activity is meant to get worker pay closer to the value workers bring to the business, not the market rate of employee value. When there is an imbalance between what the employer makes and the employees make, union activity has a decent track record of reducing that imbalance. But like you said, if the only goal was to make market rates then it would be much easier to just get a new job.
This is the part about unions I don't really like. It means that the pay of the worker is determined more by the business of the employer than by the capabilities of the worker.
The problem is employees end up earning well beyond their skill level and then they're effectively trapped in that union job because there's nowhere else they can get similar pay. And once employees are trapped managers lose their incentive to treat employees well and you end up with an adversarial relationship.
Not to mention unions
Re:Market Value (Score:5, Informative)
people need to stop equating anyone can do with easy- it's simple- but not easy and takes a huge physical toll.
Market rate is only so low because the actual costs are hidden.
As someone who worked at a distribution center. I can say that although almost anyone can do the job, and thus easily replaceable- the reality of it is that the job takes a very big toll on your body and is dangerous. And no one realizes this while they are doing it, until they get injured- and then they are screwed for life with shoulder, and back injuries because the company is too focused on efficiency to make it so the employee doesn't need to bend and reach for heavy items. The cost in lost efficiency is what matters to them, the employee eventually getting injured and then never being able to work at a full capacity is passed onto the society via health costs, lost productivity. While the company gets another human robot to do the job cheap and be replaced when it's worn out. Higher wages would at least help offset this as the employees work damn hard, and with higher wages, means more money being spent around their community, taxed by gvt and going into services that these same employees will be depending on when their body is worn out.
Fun fact- got injured- torn ligament in my shoulder- put on light duty: definition of light duty: told to go around the warehouse with a 4 foot broom and sweep 10+hrs - large 1 cubic yard tilt garbage can, -32c warehouse, walking 26 miles in one shift sweeping and picking up trash, carboard, broken pallets etc.. with one good hand.
After that.. got injured bending down and grabbing a box from under a rack in an awkward location- got 2 slipped disks- could barely stand out of bed, their return to work specialist told me to take a few robaxacett pain relief pills and start picking loads again. Her reasoning? her back hurts too, but she is able to come in and work after taking those pills- she sits in her office on a special office chair doing paper work at her desk. That injury led to over the counter pain relief causing kidney damage which then caused diabetes... the company didn't pay shit for medical expenses, the WSIB (Workplace Safety and Insurance Board) was of little help, more interested in closing the case then having me fixed so I can work again. So now i have a life-time of injuries- shoulder is still bad, back is still bad- all costs due to working at the warehouse. Multiply this by thousands of others... Were we told to lift carefully? yes. Could they have organized the warehouse to make it safer for us? Hell YES. Did they know about the dangers? YES. We paid for that extra margin of profit and efficiency with our health, and that.
You can also look at the numerous studies that essentially points out that the above story is endemic in the industry and costs are once again shifted to the public, while profits are privatized.
15 pounds? (Score:2)
Without knowing what the minimum wage is in the UK, how the fuck am I supposed to be outraged?!
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Re:15 pounds? (Score:4, Informative)
The current "National Living Wage" rate for adults aged 23 and over is £9.50, and that increases to £10.42 in April.
So £15 an hour is basically 150% "National Living Wage" rate.
Theres a separate series of "National Minimum Wage" tiers for younger workers - the "National Living Wage" is just a higher tier of the minimum wage (renamed because ... politics and PR basically).
https://www.gov.uk/national-mi... [www.gov.uk]
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So basically they want to be paid 50% more for a job that basically anybody can do, which means they can easily be replaced.
Not a smart move IMHO.
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In a unionized workplace, it is very, very difficult to simply remove and replace employees. The unions ordinarily have just as much power of hiring and firing as the business has. And if they disagree over a dismissal or disciplinary action, the unions are large enough to give the business a real PITA via legal channels -- and they would win. (breach of contract, etc)
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Workplaces in the UK are rarely “unionised” - there might be a union, there might even be two, and you can join if you want, or you can not join. Sometimes an entire workforce decides to join, or the union offers decent enough benefits to entice all to join. Oftentimes, its a mix.
That finally explains it! (Score:2)
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I think it has to do with them being tooo scared to tell their vendors to provide stuff in standardized robot handleable boxes. If Amazon was smart they'd do that instead of keeping stuff in highly variant retail packaging loosely in boxes that require a human to pick from.
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If they created standard box sizes the same way European paper works (ISO A series), they could also create standard shipping boxes as well and make it much easier to "Tetris" all boxes of an order into the shipping box. Cardboard-based spacers could be created at the same sizes as the product boxes to pad the leftover empty space when a shipping box is not completely full.
I'm not saying to make cubic boxes, but all sides could adhere to ISO A series sizes to make things easier, or something similar.
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And while they're at it creating a new product box standard, mandate a QR code of some sort in a specific corner of the box.
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There are a lot more letters than there are easily distinguishable basic shapes and colours. Using colour would prevent employing people with colour blindness, which affects approximately 4.5% of the world population. And at the speeds those fulfillment center must run, you do not want someone with a red/green or blue/green deficiency to mess up half the sorting.
I think 5% is pretty low, and I would look more closely at the font size and especially the actual font used to print those letters. Are they using
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If an order is small enough to be sent in an enveloppe, then it's obviously not part of the box size problem.
Well, of course robots are treated better (Score:4, Informative)
I have to buy robots, I have to service them and if they get defect and I have to replace them, it's on my bill.
Workers, on the other hand, are rented. If they need service, it's on their bill, if they get defect, I can throw them away and rent new ones.
Hey, you wanted to abolish slavery, don't complain now!
'Muricans (Score:3)
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There's plenty who do, many of our conservatives can be very extreme and there are a lot of them though. Most of them never leave the country either so they have no concept of how extreme they are. They honestly think they're normal.
If you look up poll numbers on American union support it's been well above 50% since WW2 though.
Robots dont strike - Proved them right (Score:2)
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Robots need maintenance and are expensive to replace. Amazon just fires people they don't want. The assertion is correct because they do treat robots better.
Pay the workers 100 GBP/hour! (Score:1)