HP IT staff still on the picket line

Day two today of the first walkout by civil servants since 1987 was expected to bring further disruption, though estimates of how many public sector staff were actually participating vary between unions and employers.

 

Members of the PCS (Public and Commercial Services) Union are striking over proposed government changes in redundancy arrangements, which they say will leave many of their lower paid (under £20,000) staff worse off. It has claimed as many as 200,000 staff did not cross picket lines yesterday on day one, though the government is telling the media the figure was closer to 81,000.

 

IT staff working for HP – inherited from its 2008 buyout of EDS – are on strike in a separate dispute over proposed redundancies. Some 1,000 PCS members working for Hewlett Packard Enterprise Services who work mainly on IT contracts for the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP), the Ministry of Defence (MoD) and General Motors Services at four HP sites, Newcastle, Washington, Preston and the Fylde Coast, are currently participating in that strike.

 

The union claimed 2,000 driving tests were called off, court sittings cancelled and tax call centres disrupted, while border controls at ports and airports and passport appointments were impacted. 

 

Despite the PCS’ comments, the government denied there’s been widespread disruption. “Services to the public are largely unaffected,” claimed minister for the Cabinet Office Tessa Jowell.  

 

Nonetheless, HMRC told The Times today that about a third of its 78,000 staff had joined the industrial action, which had put call centre staff under pressure. The public has been advised to delay tax inquiries until tomorrow as a result, when this week's action finishes. Over 3,200 Revenue and Customs staff were on strike in the giant Long Benton centre in Newcastle, while 660 out of 700 staff in Dundee’s HMRC contact centre are off today.

 

At the DWP, managers reportedly had made contingency plans and are “working on the floor” in job centres to keep them open today as well as yesterday. The Courts Service said some cases had been brought forward and urgent cases prioritised as a result of the action. 

Picket lines mounted outside government offices across the country as well as outside the House of Commons, where security staff took strike action for the first time in a generation. 

 

The PCS is campaigning on a slogan of 'No job cuts on the cheap'.