I started organising cleaners working within the Royal
Household in February 2010. PCS, the union I work for, represent most in house staff in the Royal Household, but not
the cleaners – they are employed by two private contractors KGB Holdings and
Greenzone, these companies are paid by the Royal Household to ‘oversee’
cleaning.
The British taxpayer hands the Queen £30 million a year for
the upkeep of the Royal Household, some of which goes to pay these contractors
to manage the cleaners.
One day I received a call
from a cleaner. He sounded very nervous and upset, and said they needed to join
the union ‘urgently’ as people were getting bullied, sacked on the spot. I
arranged to meet ‘Sam’ (not his real name) and his colleague ‘Daniel’ at a
local fast food outlet (I was not permitted to enter the grounds of the palace
as at that time we had no members in the cleaning section).
Sam and Daniel sat right at the back of the restaurant, and
were constantly looking over their shoulder incase anyone spotted them – it was
clear they were petrified and they talked very quickly and in hushed tones. ‘We
are very scared. Please help us. They are making us do impossible work and they
make fun of us, because we can’t speak much English. They make women lift beds
and clean the shit under them. When they complain that it hurts their backs or
that they need more time they laugh. Some people have already been sacked’.
Workers were forced to work with hazardous chemicals, in
dingy, dark surroundings with no health and safety book, no first aid box,
often on their own. They were not told what to do in the event of a fire. They
had to take their lunch in the same place the chemicals were kept, and women
and men had to change in the same room infront of each other. They had to keep
their clothes in the same cupboards chemicals were kept in, meaning they
‘always smelled of chemicals’. They suffered from red, watery eyes, coughs and
chronic back pain, were always running out of the most basic materials and
yet were bullied in to getting jobs done
without the necessary equipment - the
list went on...
The two joined PCS and between us, we developed a strategy.
Slowly but surely, cleaners joined the union. I started to get calls from
members needing advice. I spoke to a group of female members who’s hands were
red raw. When I asked them why their hands were so sore they explained that
they weren’t provided with gloves and that they had had to spend one shift
cleaning upholstery with their bare hands.
I was called by a woman who was extremely upset. I met her
and she explained that her manager had tried to force her to lift six heavy
bags of rubbish. Her shift had ended and it was too much for her, too heavy, so
she refused. The manager snatched her pass off her and she was sacked on the
spot.
She collapsed and started to cry, so he called the palace
police and she was dragged off site.
Unfortunately, she was not a member of the union, but I put
her in touch with a legal firm and I understand she is taking action against
the employer.
I could go on, but it would take weeks to cover the full
extent of the horrors.
Naturally, we came down very hard on the employer and the
manager responsible got sacked. Things improved for a short while, and I was
able to win a small pay rise for the cleaners, which boosted morale and was an
example of what being in a union can achieve.
The new management attempted several underhand tactics,
issuing ‘at risk of redundancy’ notices to anyone I had represented for example
(a clear case of union victimisation – this was the only way the employer was
able to identify union members from non-union members). But they couldn’t get away with it as we were
building and growing in numbers.
As members became more confident, they realised that they
had put up with too much for too long.
They knew their worth, and they were
worth a lot more than £6.45 per hour. They knew their counterparts down the
road in the Palace of Westminster and the House of Lords earned the recommended
Living Wage for London £7.85 and wanted the same rate. As one said ‘they think,
just because we clean up shit, we have shit for brains’.
Or as ‘Anthony’ said in a recent
interview with the Guardian newspaper when asked by the interviewer: So what would a rise of £1.40 an
hour mean to Anthony? "The difference between working two jobs a day –
like I do at the moment – and having some time to see my children, or
my friends, or going to college." (the article goes on to say that Anthony
works such long hours he will often crawl into bed exhausted and fully clothed,
only to surface and go to work again four hours later)
After holding several clandestine members meetings it was
agreed to mount a Living Wage campaign and to tie in with the Royal Wedding. If
that didn’t get us results, we would stage a further campaign around President
Barack Obama’s state visit in May. Afterall, can you imagine the embarrassment
of having America’s first black president stay at Buckingham Palace being
mopped after by black and migrant workers on £6.45 per hour?
There are only 25 cleaners in the Royal Household, surely
the mere threat of this would have them running to the negotiating table?
Er...sadly, no.
Much correspondence and protracting occurred, with no
results. Chair of PCS’s parliamentary committee John McDonnell
was appalled and immediately stepped in to offer help and support. He tabled an
early day motion to parliament on the issue.
We mounted an online petition on the PCS website and had
thousands of flyers and stickers printed ‘Fair Pay for Royal Cleaners’ – the
design features a coat of arms for cleaners: mop, brush, rake and bucket’ at
it’s centre. Kate Middleton’s coat of
arms was unveiled a day after ours, at a cost of £4,400 – the irony was not
lost on us.
A timetable of leafleting tube stations, Trafalgar square,
Parliament and Buckingham palace staff entrances commenced and we were met with
support from all quarters of society. One young woman worker who took a leaflet
rushed back to say ‘this is disgusting. I am a single mum and if I can pay my
cleaner £8.00 per hour, so can the bloody Queen’.
The campaign received international press coverage from
America to Brazil.
Due to a ban on protest on the day of the wedding itself, we
decided to march on Buckingham Palace on the eve of the wedding.
We were joined by trade unionists from other unions and
community activists. John McDonnell led the march proclaiming ‘these people are
royal cleaners. Pay them a living wage!’
We carried flags, placards, buckets and brushes and
brandished them at the curious masses in a peaceful way. We attempted a
stationary protest outside the main palace gates, but kept getting moved on by police. A couple of
by-standards spat and shouted abuse but overall, the response was good. We got
dozens of signatures for our giant ‘fair pay for royal cleaners sign’, which we
will hand in to the queen on 24 May.
We marched around the front of the palace several times but
it proved impossible with the police continually moving us on, so we decided to
change tack and march across the royal parks instead, to applause from
passers-by and the world’s media.
Since our protest, KGB and the royal household tell me that
they are looking at ‘efficiencies’ in order to ‘improve salaries’. As we all know,
‘efficiencies is often code for job cuts and harsher working conditions.
We will escalate our campaign to coincide with Barack
Obama’s visit and beyond that if they don’t pay up.
It is clear that private contractors occupy the position
those brutal industrial mill owners used to back in the 19 C. So often unheard,
workers who need representation the most fall through the net due to erratic
working patterns, language barriers, fear and insecure citizenship. As more and
more public sector jobs are outsourced, it is more vital than ever that the
trade union movement takes a serious and pro-active approach to organising
privately contracted areas.
The situation that met me at the royal household is only the
tip of the iceberg. How many other hundreds if not thousands of workers out
there are brutalised in this way on a daily basis. We must not, we CANNOT allow
these private companies to get away with it.
Please do all that you can to support our campaign – sign
our petition: www.pcs.org.uk/royal
cleaners , agree to distribute leaflets to your friends, families, workplaces
and communities; ask your MP to sign EDM 1696.
See Reel News interview with a royal cleaner and footage
from the palace protest: http://www.youtube.com/user/ReelNews
Get in touch if you would like a speaker from the campaign
at your trade union branch/community group, or if you would like to get
involved with our campaign.
