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Justice For Agency Workers

The CWU has been campaigning for equal treatment in the workplace for tens of thousands of telecom workers for nearly a decade.
The union's campaign "Justice for Agency Workers" is headed up by national officer Sally Bridge and aims to establish equal treatment in relation to pay, working conditions, holiday entitlement and discrimination at work.
In 2006, the CWU joined a coalition of other UK unions and social partners from across Europe in taking our campaign to the European Parliament, where the issue had lain dormant since the 2002 introduction of the Temporary Agency Worker Directive (TAWD).
In early 2007, the coalition in the UK took the issue direct to the heart of the Government when Newcastle-Under-Lyme MP Paul Farrelly MP laid down a Private Members Bill - The Temporay and Agency Workers (Prevention of Less favourable treatment) Bill.
Private Members Bills (PMBs) very rarely become law due to the limited time they are given and especially so if the Government gives them no support. The coalition sought support from across the Parliamentry Labour Party (PLP) and the Labour Government for the Bill but where unable to secure the neccassary support needed from the Government and subsequently ran out time during the Parliamentary process.
In the 2008 PMB ballot, Andrew Miller MP (Ellesmere Port & Neston) - a good friend of Tony Woodley, joint general secretary of the Unite union - took up the mantle and laid down a new Bill - The Temporary Agency Workers (Equal Treatment) Bill.
With support from the PLP, and enough parliamentary time remaining to see the Private Members Bill come to fruition, for the first time, there was now a realistic chance of success.
The Labour Government began to realise that support for equal treatment for agency workers was not going away and that a potential "Banana skin" was looming for them, in that they would have to rely on Tory support to stop the Bill proceeding through the legislative process.
In late January 2008, the Government anounced that an independently chaired forum of representatives from the Government, TUC and CBI would meet to discuss proposals to unlock the impasse of the TAWD and allow legislation to pass through the European Parliament.
This tri-partite body reached agreement and, subseqeuntly, the Directive passed through the EU, after which, a series of consultations began in the UK to allow the EU Directive to become law. The CWU engaged in all of the consultations including regional forums and even a high-level body that included Sally Bridge, focussing on the more controversial elements of the Directive.
On Tuesday 1 February 2010, under a "statutory instrument," the Agency Workers Regulations 2010 began its final passage of UK legislation to become enshrined in UK law.
Under this "statutory instrument," which results in binding legislation if not challenged and annulled during a 40-day period, the Agency Workers Regulations 2010 will belatedly implement an EU Directive, giving agency workers the right to the same pay, holiday and other basic working conditions as their directly recruited counterparts after 12 weeks in a given job.
The tabling of the Agency Workers Regulation 2010 marks a significant chapter in the history of the union's "Justice for Agency Workers" campaign.
The legislation will see real improvements for tens of thousands of CWU members and over a million workers in every MP's constituency across the UK.

What is a Stautory Instrument?
A Statutory instrument (SI) is a form of legislation that allows the provision of an Act of Parliament to be brought into force without Parliament having to pass a new Act. An SI becomes law on the date stated on it, but could be annulled if any Member of the House of Commons puts down a motion, usually an EDM, which is known as a "prayer." Although this is unlikely to be accepted for debate unless it is tabled by the official opposition. The last time an SI was annulled in the House of Commons was in 1979.

02/02/10

News Update:
www.cwu.org/news/archive/battle-lines-drawn-on-agency-exploitation.html

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Any queries on Justice for Agency Workers issues should be addressed to agencycampaign@cwu.org.