Guardian: UK Academic workers talk industrial action as Universities plan cuts

 The Guardian is reporting that at least 9 universities in the United Kingdom are planning job cuts due to falling expected revenue. Employees and advocates are calling the move despicable as workers who have been stretched thin to provide services to students in the middle of the global COVID-19 pandemic are seeing the universities turn their backs on them.

Union leadership is saying that anger and frustration is palpable among their members as this news has come down. These feelings have not been tampered as some institutions have seen leading union members and activists placed on universities' mandatory redundancy lists.

The move by the universities has prompted discussion of industrial action, with members in many locations taking actions just short of an outright strike.

UNISON: UK libraries should stay closed to protect library workers and families

 The United Kingdom's largest union, UNISON, has called for libraries to completely close during the UK's third lock down amid a new highly contagious strain of the COVID-19 virus.

The government's stated guidelines ask for libraries to continue services such as IT access and curbside service. Facing a growing health crisis UNISON views even these services as too dangerous for library workers, who will have to provide these services, and their families

Compounding the problem for library workers, the union argues, is the fact that many library workers are already isolating and more are to be deployed for food delivery and other services leaving already struggling libraries under staffed.

Greenwich Library Workers Stage 48-Hour Strike

The planned cancellation of a mobile book service has prompted Greenwich library workers to strike for 48 hours this week. Over the last year, the mobile book service delivered 33,000 books to area children at schools and child-care centers. A Unite official said:

Literacy is a fundamental human right and anything that erodes that life chance should be strongly opposed. Good reading skills are the key to decent employment in adulthood – so the blinkered actions of the council need to be condemned.

Barnet Library Workers Strike in Protest of Plans for Unstaffed Libraries

Barnet Council library workers are on strike once again in continued protest of planned changes to library services and staff hours. The council is facing serious budget cuts, and in response has plans to keep libraries open to the public without library staff present. They hope to accomplish this by staffing the libraries with volunteers and installing self-service equipment as well as security cameras. Children under the age of 15 years will be unable to make use of these unstaffed locations unless accompanied by an adult. Barnet Council hopes these measures will save  £2.85 million.

Six of Barnet's library branches were closed this week as a result of the strike. Barnet library workers are represented by UNISON.

Bristol Library Workers Strike

Library workers in Bristol, England went on strike earlier this week in protest of changes to their work schedules. Due to changes to the libraries' opening hours, workers will be scheduled to work an increased number of shorter shifts. Bristol City Council chose to shorten the libraries' opening hours instead of closing library branches in order to save money. The workers are represented by UNISON.

Association of Teachers and Lecturers Calls for School Library Inspections

The Association of Teachers and Lecturers, the union representing education professionals in the United Kingdom, passed a motion calling for inspection of school libraries by the Office for Standards in Education, Children's Services and Skills, citing reductions in library collections and decreasing library staff. The individual who proposed the motion stated:

“How can you have a school without a library? Libraries are a mirror of the societies in which we live and grow. Should that be forgotten, ignored or disregarded, then it will reflect badly on everything that is truly good about education in its widest sense.”

Bristol Library Workers Vote in Favor of Strike

Library assistants in Bristol have voted in favor of strike action in response to the closure of one of the city's libraries and the reduction of hours at the remaining six libraries. The changes in hours of operation has resulted in changes to the library assistants' work schedules. The workers are members of UNISON.

Strike in Lambeth

Library workers in Lambeth held a two-day strike last week in protest of planned branch closures. The workers were joined by UNISON members from nearby districts, as well as supporters from the community. The planned closures in Lambeth echo a troubling trend in the UK of library closures, conversion of library spaces to exercise facilities, and reliance on volunteers to run library services.

Photos and video of last week's strike can be viewed on the union's blog.

Strike at Bolton College

Bolton College was closed on Wednesday as library workers, lecturers, and support staff went on strike amid proposals for a wage freeze. The workers are represented by Unison and University and College Union.

Supporters Speak Up For Libraries in UK

Yesterday library staff, authors, and other library supporters gathered together at Central Hall Westminster in London as part of Speak Up For Libraries, a rally in protest of widespread funding cuts and closures of library services across the UK. After several speeches from various library supporters and a UNISON representative, attendees were encouraged to meet with their Members of Parliament in the House of Commons. Search the hashtag #SUFLlobby16 on Twitter for pictures and commentary on yesterday's event.

Staff at several library systems, including Greenwich, Bromley, and Lambeth, are on strike this week in conjunction with yesterday's protest. Tim O'Dell, a UNISON representative, said:

We’re closing the libraries for a day to fight for the future of the service.

A library staff member was quoted as saying:

Libraries are a valuable community resource providing all sort of services. What replaces that if you take it away? These gyms will have a few shelves of books—that’s not a library service. 

Various boroughs have proposed closing libraries, staffing remaining library branches with volunteers, and incorporating library services into "leisure centers" including gym facilities, in response to cuts in funding.

Planned Library Closures in Darlington, UK

Unite, the union representing library workers in the borough of Darlington, has spoken out against planned cuts to library services in that borough. The council has proposed closing two of the library branches in the borough as well as the library's mobile service, which would also result in the loss of thirty staff positions.

Strike Vote in Lambeth

Library workers in Lambeth, a borough of London, England, have voted in favor of strike action as part of their campaign to protest the closure of library branches, as well as plans to turn some branches into health centers operated by Greenwich Leisure Limited. The workers are represented by UNISON.

Protests at Lambeth Libraries

Library workers in Lambeth staged a walk-out earlier this week in protest of budget cuts, including plans put forward by Lambeth Council to reduce library services at several locations to make way for fitness centers. Library staff and supporters also engaged in a protest at a council meeting on Wednesday. The reduction in library services will include a reduction in the work force.

VIDEOS: Barnet UNISON Strike Action Continues

As documented on this blog, library workers and other employees in Barnet Council have engaged in strike action, petitions, and other activity for months in response to plans to privatize much of the Council's services, including libraries. UNISON has planned another one-day strike for Monday, November 2.

Members of the union have put together two music videos related to the Council's outsourcing plans, The EasyCouncil Locomotion and Unison's Army.

“What Will Remain Will Not Be Worth the Name Library” - Barnet Council Library Workers Strike

Library and other workers in Barnet Council went on strike again today as part of a series of strikes and campaigns in protest of plans to outsource library services. The Council released a report last week detailing significant layoffs and other cuts to services. In response to the report, Hugh Jordan, the union's library convenor, said “what will remain will not be worth the name library.” Council employees are represented by UNISON.

Library Closures and Lay-Offs in Kirklees

Despite the efforts of Unite Community in petitioning against lay-offs and closures in Kirklees Council, cabinet ministers there have approved a plan to close two of the council's twenty-six library locations and possibly eliminate 88 full-time equivalent positions. Only eight of the remaining libraries will be staffed by librarians and funded by the council. The other sixteen libraries will rely on volunteers and a single council employee at each location. All mobile library services have been eliminated.

New Report from Unison Scotland

Unison Scotland has issued the results of its survey of library workers across the country, entitled Read It and Weep: Scotland's Library Staff Speak Out. From the report:

Libraries are a valued and vital cultural and community resource. If good intentions and fine words were reflected in budgets then our Library staff would be substantially happier than they are. Instead they cope daily with increasing workloads, widening responsibilities, and a more demanding set of customers . This is compounded by their own knowledge that it doesn’t have to be like this – they know what they are capable of and how their service could be delivered better and adapted for the future. Government at all levels needs to start backing up their professed affection for libraries with the investment that the service requires to go forward. Library staff are understandably and rightly frustrated at the current state of affairs. They, and all of us, deserve better. 

Campaign to Save Libraries in Kirklees

A campaign is currently underway in protest of potential staff lay-offs and library closures in Kirklees. The local branch of Unite Community, community branches of Unite that are open for unemployed individuals to join, has started a petition and engaged in a demonstration earlier this week.

Strike at National Museums of Scotland

Workers at the National Museum of Scotland and the National War Museum are on strike as part of an on-going protest over the removal of a weekend pay allowance affecting new hires. Workers who joined the museum staff in 2011 and later do not receive the special allowance for working on weekends, while those who began their employment earlier than the cutoff continue to receive this money. According to a union spokesman:

"If someone was employed by the National Museum of Scotland in December 2010 and worked weekends then they earn between £2,000 and £3,000 more than a colleague working beside them if they joined in January 2011, so it's wrong that this is the case."

The museum workers are members of the Public and Commercial Services Union.

Strike Action at National Gallery

Workers at the National Gallery in London have announced plans to go on an "all-out" strike next month over plans to privatize sections of the museum. They have been engaging in strike action since February, staging one-day walkouts 51 times thus far. Workers at the museum are represented  by the Public and Commercial Services Union.

The National Gallery has issued a statement about the ongoing strike action on its website.