Birmingham bin strike: Downing Street calls on Unite to negotiate in 'good faith'

Downing Street is calling on Unite to negotiate 'in good faith' to help bring the Birmingham bin strikes to an end.

Rubbish is continuing to pile up on the city's streets - and there are big queues for mobile waste trucks, where people are dropping off bin bags.

It's also emerged police have installed barriers to stop lorries being blocked from leaving depots.

A Number 10 spokesman said:

"The residents of Birmingham are our first and foremost priority, and as you will have seen, the local government minister Jim McMahon was in Birmingham yesterday meeting council leaders and commissioners to discuss the council's response and make sure this is being gripped.

"Following that meeting, police have installed barriers at the picket line to prevent waste lorries being recklessly blocked from leaving the depots this morning to start dealing with the backlog.

"Unite need to focus on negotiating in good faith, drop their opposition to changes needed to resolve long-standing equal pay issues, and get round the table with the council to bring this strike to an end."

Yesterday the Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner gave us her reaction to the dispute.

In response Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said:

“It is not surprising that many workers in Britain question the Labour government’s commitment to working people, when it issues a statement clearly blaming bin workers in a dispute not of their making.

“The bottom line about this dispute is that these workers, woke up one morning to be told they would be taking up to an £8,000 pay cut. They are being made to pay the price for austerity and bad decisions by Birmingham City Council.

“Hold the front page, Unite has already agreed major changes, with the removal of job and knock and shift pay last year and in Unite's current proposals there are no equal pay issues. This authority is determined to impose cuts on workers at any cost and has moved the goalposts again.

“Unite’s team of decision makers has been in negotiations in good faith for weeks. It is the leader of the council who is missing in action and who has not been in any of the talks. Indeed the council are only scheduling meetings once a week. Unite has said it is ready to negotiate anytime and everyday if necessary.

“The government is going to have to wake up and smell the coffee that they are part of this dispute, as the commissioners report directly to them and they own the £3.9 billion debt of the council.

“If the government were really concerned about the residents of Birmingham they would get the decision makers in a room of which they are clearly one, to ensure that Unite’s solutions on the table were adopted.

“Yet again workers and communities pay the price for government inaction.”

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