Justice for Agency Workers ‘Euro-trashed’ Campaign
Temporary agency workers are typically amongst the most vulnerable UK workers, often found in the lower paid jobs, particularly in the catering, call centre and care sectors. The agency workforce is also significantly younger than the average.
Compared to people in permanent employment, agency workers currently lose out in terms of pay, holidays, entitlement to family-friendly rights such as maternity, paternity leave and parental leave, and are often excluded from training and other career development opportunities.
- Agency Pay Protest at BT AGM
CWU members and agency workers from across the country demonstrated outside BT's Annual General Meeting to highlight problems faced by the two-tier workforce.
Gordon Brown's statement is a welcome step forward on agency rights
The CWU has welcomed the Government's Draft legislative programme for 2008/09 that includes new rules to ensure temporary workers are treated the same as their permanent colleagues. The Government states they will continue to pursue an agreement on the treatment of agency workers through an EU Directive incorporating the principle of equal treatment.
Billy Hayes, CWU General Secretary said: "I am pleased to hear such positive statement coming from the Prime Minister. There remains a lot of detail to be agreed but this is a positive step in bringing equality of rights to over a million of the most vulnerable workers and their families".
More information
- Joint Declaration by the Government, CBI and TUC
- Andrew Miller MP sponsored the Equal Treatment for Agency Workers Bill previously supported by Paul Farrelly. Labour MPs vote for Agency Rights
- MP John McDonnell's Early Day Motion
- Second Reading of Paul Farrelly`s Private Members Bill
- Agency Workers: The Myths Trashed
- The Department of Trade & Industry have announced they intend to consult on plans to protect vulnerable agency workers and clamp down on rogue companies.
- Following on from Paul Farrelly's Private Members Bill that fell due to insufficient parliamentary time, a New Early Day Motion has now been sponsored.
- To show support you can sign the Online Petition on the Head Office web site: http://www.cwu.org/default.asp?step=12
- MP Paul Farrelly's Private Members Bill on agency workers was blocked by the Minister
- MP Jon Cruddas' Early Day Motion
- What is an Early Day Motion? http://edmi.parliament.uk/edmi/