Outsourced OCS workers to vote on strike action

Outsourced cleaners, caterers and facilities staff working at the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office in East Kilbride are to be balloted for strike action. The ballot will run from 16 to 30 August and ask members if they are prepared to take strike action over pay and a refusal to provide them with equal core employment terms with their civil service colleagues.

The PCS members employed by OCS at Abercrombie House are demanding a minimum pay rate of £15 per hour, contractual sick pay from day one, an increase in annual leave to 30 days and improvements to redundancy terms.

PCS general secretary Fran Heathcote said: “Our members in East Kilbride deserve better pay for the essential work they do to keep the FCDO running.”

“OCS whose profits have recently been boosted by their acquisition of facilities management company, Atalian Servest knows this. Yet despite being able to afford to pay more, they choose not to, and continue to prioritise profits for shareholders over decent wages and employment terms for low paid workers.”

“OCS should do the decent thing and pay their staff the wages they deserve and end in work poverty once and for all.”