VER 50 low paid and • mainly Asian have been on strike for five months at Hillingdon Hospital in West London. Their employer, Pall Mall Management, wanted to cut their wages by 20 per cent and sacked them when they refused to goree.
A company with fingers in many ples Pall Mall is involved in government-backed initiatives bringing more private finance into the health service to run services and build hospitals. To prop up the dispute it is bringing scab labour from as far away as Newcastle.
Newly elected London con. venor for UNISON, Geoff Martin, said that while the company was going to great lengths to smash the dispute the women were prepared to stick it out for as long as it takes.
He added however that the dispute necos all the assistance it can get and that winning it was important in terms of the continuing struggle against privatisation in the health service.
The strikers have made links with women involved in the docks dispute in Liverpool and some of these will be attending a demonstration this coming Saturday. The demonstration starts Colfam Green Hospital at 11.30 am and will march to a rally at the Hillingdon Civic Centre at 1 pm. Strikers have mode links with woren involved in the docks dispute The Liverpool Dockers have shown the way forward in re-arming the workers' movement. The TGWU leaders must be pressured into fully recognising the dispute and fighting for their members.
Socialist Outlook 97 • February 17, 1996.