Water strike 'won't affect services'
STRIKE action from water workers will not disrupt services, says Anglian Water.
GMB union workers who do maintenance for the company could be facing a £2,500 pay cut.
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DISPUTE: The GMB union has warned strike action by Anglian Water workers could impact on services, but Anglian Water says work will not be interrupted.
They have voted to take official strike action on June 12 and end any goodwill work done from June 8.
Lincoln has the county's biggest Anglian Water call centre as well as a water works and sewage treatment works and the GMB has warned the strike action could impact on household water supplies and the safe disposal of sewage.
But Anglian Water says the dispute will not lead to work being interrupted.
Chief Operating Officer at Anglian Water Peter Simpson said: "The dispute is about a minor change to start times.
"We're asking staff to start work at 10am, instead of 8am, to ensure we have most cover available when we are busiest.
"Many of our staff already work to these new arrangements."
In a statement issued to the Echo Anglian Water said 235 trade union members were balloted for industrial action and less than half voted for a strike.
Mr Simpson said:"Since the new arrangements began on April 1, we've improved service to customers and reduced the use of outside contractors by 40 per cent.
"We urge union members to step back from strike action and to agree to the new working arrangements.
"Meanwhile we can reassure customers that we have contingency arrangements in place to ensure there will be no disruption to services."
The dispute is over a potential annual loss of up to £2,500 pay following the company's decision to impose shift and working time changes
For more on the dispute, see Tuesday's Echo.
Comments
by David Turpin, easton on the hill
Tuesday, June 02 2009, 2:51PM
“I work for Anglian Water and I am affected by the changes. There is the possible loss of upto £2500 , will more likley work out to about £1000 as standby isnt garenteed. I have worked the hours once already as Anglian Water were threating anyone that didnt with disaplinary action if we didnt work it !! While working the hours my sleeping habits were badly affected took me a week to get back to normal, also messed my eating habits up as some days wasnt getting the chance to eat until 9pm onwards, which as everyone knows isnt good for you. I was actually ill over the following weekend due to my sleeping and eating habits being messed up.
The way Anglian Water have gone about implimenting the changes has been extremely out of order in many employees opions, threating peoples jobs is extremely low espeacilly in todays economic climate.
The strike action will affect customer service as other employees who arent stricking will have to cross picket lines, which from the ones I have spoken to they are not willing to do this.
Peter Simpson has yet to produce any evidence that the changes have made savings he just keeps saying it. I know in my area contarctors were used as little as possible as they do not do as good a job as AW staff, and I have not seen any change in the amount of contractors being used.
I also know that for the collection side of the compay the new hours arent working very well as every morning they are down to 4 people out of eight and thats only if no one is off sick or on holiday.
Another major issue with the new hours is, that in the winter when its dark at 4-5pm there are lots of Health and Safety issues with working in the dark, as the majoritory of our sites are extremely poorly lite.”