Yorkshire dinner ladies get ready for new strike

26 October 2000
Yorkshire dinner ladies get ready for new strike

School dinner ladies in the East Riding of Yorkshire could be about to stage more strike action against Martin's Contract Catering following a new twist to a long-running pay dispute.

Last year union members among the region's 800 school-meals staff held a series of protests.

The row was about their terms and conditions of employment, which Martin's was trying to change.

Martin's later agreed to compensate workers who had had their pay cut and to reinstate the terms and conditions that had been in place before it took over the catering contract in January 1999.

Despite the agreement, the TGWU, GMB and Unison unions claim Martin's is now proposing to slash workers' hours by 10%.

The unions also claim the catering firm has refused to implement the 3% pay rise for the staff, which they should have received in April.

In the next few weeks the dinner ladies will be balloted by the unions on whether they want to take industrial action.

Chris Jenkinson, Unison regional officer, said the children would suffer if there were strike action.

Peter Martin, managing director of Martin's, said staff hours had been hit by a 15p increase in primary school meals, which had meant the number of school meals served had fallen.

But he added: "We believe after half term we will recover the situation and will be able to put hours back as opposed to take hours out." He said all the dinner ladies had had their 3% pay rise.

by Louise Bozec

The Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email

Start the working day with The Caterer’s free breakfast briefing email

Sign Up and manage your preferences below

Check mark icon
Thank you

You have successfully signed up for the Caterer Breakfast Briefing Email and will hear from us soon!

Jacobs Media is honoured to be the recipient of the 2020 Queen's Award for Enterprise.

The highest official awards for UK businesses since being established by royal warrant in 1965. Read more.

close

Ad Blocker detected

We have noticed you are using an adblocker and – although we support freedom of choice – we would like to ask you to enable ads on our site. They are an important revenue source which supports free access of our website's content, especially during the COVID-19 crisis.

trade tracker pixel tracking