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