Workers at Britain’s largest container port will go on strike on August 21.
Nearly 100% of the Unite union membership has voted to walk out over wages at Felixstowe port, which handles almost half of Britain’s container traffic.
The move risks a repeat of last year’s port backlogs, when the Institute of Export and International Trade predicted it would take five years to recover operations back to pre-Covid 19 levels.
Rejecting a pay offer of 5% from port operator Hong Kong’s Hutchison Ports, workers will down tools for eight days on August 21, calling the offer ’an effective pay cut’, with the real rate of inflation standing at 11.9%.
The offer was then raised to 7%, which has also been rejected.
“Both Felixstowe docks and its parent company CK Hutchison Holding Ltd are both massively profitable and incredibly wealthy. They are fully able to pay the workforce a fair day’s pay,” said Unite general secretary Sharon Graham. “The company has prioritised delivering multi-million-pound dividends rather than paying its workers a decent wage.”
Britain has been threatened by or endured a wave of strikes across many sectors, including health services, rail transport, post, fire fighting and law.
