Workers at the Hovis (Premier Foods) Bakery in Wigan have voted to strike after the management followed up pay and hours cuts, and eventually redundancies, with the introduction of zero-hours contracts for workers brought in to make up the shortfall.
Three sets of strikes have been set for August and September, and into the start of October, with more to come if the company fails to reach an agreement.
The workers, members of the Bakers Food and Allied Workers Union, “are determined not to allow the company to set precedents, undermine current terms and conditions, create a two-tier workforce and leave a poor legacy for subsequent generations of people who may be employed at Hovis in the future”, says the union.
• Figures collated by the House of Commons Library and released in August reveal that real wages (after inflation) in Britain fell by 5.5 per cent over the past three years. ■