back to article Fujitsu strike to hit back-office across UK.gov

Delays in the delivery of driving licences and tax returns could result from a threatened strike by 1,000 of Fujitsu's 10,000 British workers. UK employees of the Japanese multinational will take part in the 24-hour strike starting at midnight on 19 September, after they rejected a pay offer from their Fujitsu bosses. Daily …

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  1. Juillen 1

    Pay rise..

    Got to love it where the Private sector is out striking over a low pay rise, and the public sector is still in and working with a 2 year pay freeze..

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Many of those involved used to be public sector workers before they were privatised - forcibly. Oh, and they're coming off the back of a three year pay freeze as well, apart from the account managers obviously. Whoever you work for it isn't much fun at the moment. Good luck with your pay negotiations.

      1. Mark 65

        @AC

        Don't like it? Get another sodding job. For £13,500/yr it shouldn't be difficult. The point is these people may have been forcibly privatised but they don't seem to realise that they won't get anywhere holding on to their public sector entitlement culture.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          "public sector entitlement culture"? Bless.

          Having worked for two huge corps for far longer than I was ever a civil servant I'm so far away from a public sector culture of any sort that that jibe is laughable.

          The only entitlement that I feel is for a decent pay rise for the job that I do. If he company won't reward me adequately then I'll try to do what I can about it. As the normal means of doing as good as job as I can, a better one than most according to my reviews, has got me nowhere then we get to the point that we've got to.

          This is all purely a private sector affair, trust me.

          1. Mark 65

            @AC, you either didn't read or didn't comprehend what I wrote. I know it is "purely a private sector affair" however it was earlier stated that they were forcibly privatised from the public sector. The public sector entitlement culture of which I speak is that of blanket x% pay rises. Sorry, but the private sector doesn't like that so much and so to keep arguing for it is to keep going back to the very roots from where you were ejected. They should grasp the opportunity to: differentiate themselves from the others at their level and hence be promoted or give themselves a better chance of better remuneration; and/or they should look elsewhere.

            If you've done a great job according to your reviews and it's gotten you nowhere then use a little entrepreneurial spirit and find another job so you can tell your current employer to shove theirs up their arse. If you're not prepared to do that then sit down and suck it up 'cos they'll be delivering much more of the same. I've done it and it's liberating. I even know of managers that don't give long term employees decent pay rises despite good reviews. When I asked why they responded "why would I, they're going to stay anyway". Like it or loathe it, it's the way the world spins.

  2. Bluenose
    Thumb Down

    What nonesense

    "action like this highlights the dangers for government departments relying on single suppliers."

    As none of the depts you mention relies on a single supplier the above is ridiculous. This article is scaremongering of the highest order. Here we are talking about 1,000 workers spread over three big employers and we are claiming that there will be major problems!

    DVLA employes close to 6,000 people, HMRC at least 3-4 times that many and when we get to MoD well lets not even try and do the numbers. This strike will have minimal impact on the performance of the departments not least because the numbers involved are so low and the people concerned work only in a the technology support area and not the part where the work is actually done (and performed by civil servants).

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      It's "nonsense", actually

      And yes, Fujitsu are not the lead supplier to those departments but they do tend to be the one that keeps the tin spinning. How much work do you reckon HMRC, for instance, will manage to get through without the servers that run the systems?

      1. Mark 65

        "How much work do you reckon HMRC, for instance, will manage to get through without the servers that run the systems?"

        Why, are they on strike too?

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          No, not at the moment. But how much if their daily work is conducted using their IT systems? Take those out and there's not much money moving around.

  3. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Only £13,500? Go and get another job if you want a pay rise then. Presumably you knew the salary when you accepted this one.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Or maybe if everyone who's getting low wages fought together to improve their terms and conditions rather than running away and leaving them behind we could drag the floor up a little higher? Collective action has achieved that in the past.

  4. All names Taken
    Trollface

    Offshore it!

    Put the business offshore due to importance of the data and stuff being processed!

  5. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    I'd be interested to know

    How many on here are getting / expecting better than a 1.5-2.5% increase this year.

    1. Mark 65

      Expected and got. Block pay bargaining has it's limits. Looking a better deal than the next guy works wonders

  6. AJ MacLeod

    Responsibility? Unions don't know the meaning of the word

    So these union members are providing critical public services... about time they recognised that THEY have primary responsibility for what happens. It's the Union that are destroying the public service with their characteristic greed; their members were fortunate to be offered any kind of pay rise and if they don't think it's reflective of their worth they can move to those other companies who will pay them massively more. Or perhaps not.

    Unions... String them up, the lot of them, and we might actually get some industry back. They might be a nice idea in theory but the practice is as ugly as can be...

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      It's the company that the union members are working for that has the responsibility for providing critical public services. If that company has pissed off its staff to the point that they are prepared to strike to back up their claims than I'd suggest that the company has screwed up somewhere along the line.

      No-one is fortunate to be offered any sort of pay rise, pay rises are earned. The company are presumably doing well in this line of business - the senior managers are getting good bonuses - so those further down the tree must have done something right and it's not unreasonable to expect equivalent reward. Yes, they could move to another company, but that just leaves the problem behind. Better, perhaps, to try to improve conditions in the company for which you work. If we all did that then we might be able to fight back against the race to the bottom that we have all been losers in for the past decade.

      I would say that it is the companies to which our public services have been outsourced that have endangered them, by stripping money out the system and exporting it to the HQs in the USA (HP, IBM, Accenture), Japan (Fujitsu) and France (Capgemini, ATOS), by offshoring as much as they can get away and trying to offshore ever more (HP and DWP, for instance) and as stated above, by pissing off their staff enough to drive them to take industrial action.

      Outsourcing companies ... String them up, the lot of them, and we might actually get some decent employers back. They might be a nice idea in theory but the practice is as ugly as can be...

      1. Mark 65

        "Yes, they could move to another company, but that just leaves the problem behind. Better, perhaps, to try to improve conditions in the company for which you work. "

        Not necessarily. Sooner or later constantly replacing staff becomes really expensive and senior managers (normally the problem) start getting their arses kicked. Going out on strike you appear like trouble makers, going out and getting a better job tells the company they're shit.

        1. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          "Going out on strike you appear like trouble makers".

          Well, yes, it could do that, unless you drill down to the cause of the trouble. A switched on management would take notice of that and seek to address it with as much urgency as an elevated turnover rate. (Relying on turnover rate as the only metric of staff dissatisfaction is dangerously short-sighted, but a lot of companies seem to do it, ho hum).

          Anyway, what's so wrong with causing a bit of trouble? Progress is only ever made by trouble makers.

        2. Anonymous Coward
          Anonymous Coward

          See below

          But when all the staff have left, the outsourcing companies will bleat to the govermnet about how hard it is to recruit staff, and then they'll con the government into allowing them to offshore the work - claiming lack of staff in the UK to do the work, and how much better * the service will be.

          * better AKA cheaper.

  7. Jonathan McColl

    Fujitsu has the IT services contract for my council (Highland) and they hit the headlines quite frequently for cocking things up, today's being their loss of email for the whole council for three days. I'd bet their customer relations managers are considering the strikes have timing which may be less than ideal.

  8. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    Recently offered a 60k+ job with Fujitsu, at 24k salary - no wonder they're striking! & yes, I did reject it!!

  9. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    So, the warehouse guys are going on strike again.

    I love Fujitsu, they keep paying me more, every year, and awarding me stuff.

    I noticed that the harder I work the more money and junk I get too.

    PEACE

  10. Anonymous Coward
    Anonymous Coward

    A couple of things not mentioned. The union didnt actually ballot members but decided to strike without asking the members (i know several PCS members who have complained as they are not willing to strike).

    Also the pay deal also includes the clause If you are earning under 14500 a year then you get raised to 14500 first then the pay rise.

    1. Anonymous Coward
      Anonymous Coward

      Ballots

      The union balloted its members on whether or not they were prepared to strike before calling the strike, it would be illegal to do otherwise. If the members were happy with the pay offer and they didn't want to strike to back up their claim for a better deal trhey wouldn't have voted to strike. Not everyone voted to strike, so I'm not surprised that not everyone is willing to strike - that's the way that ballots work - but as a significant majority were in favour then it would seem that a signficant majority will be on strike.

      1. darklord
        Thumb Down

        I work for fujitsu too

        My colleagues who are in the Unite union do not even know about these strikes therefore its safe to assume they were not balloted.

        Fujitsu employees have had a 3 yr pay freeze and no bonus's to most employees either.

        Most of the union mebers are warehouse staff not site staff so wont affect the customers too much. Every one i know in this organisation would not do something to harm customer relationships and t would be unheard of for a long time employee to strike or picket a customer site.

        Those who will are generally Tupe'd from the civill service who couldn't care a less as long as they keep there pensions and bonuses etc. seen and met to many to count. then bitch how good it was beofre yet this is there former employer who screwed them over. go figure.

        a lot of the problems we have are not generated by the private sector but are the first reactions following the goverment cuts and the fact theres little to money around or new contracts being awarded at the moment.

  11. Scott 19
    FAIL

    Optional

    I'm always amazed by the ignorance on such matters, if you have no idea what is happening then I would suggest you do not comment, then again round here everyone has a comment so that will not work.

    And try and work out 1.5% of 13,500 grand? that will not cover the increase to get to work for the year, inflation in this coutry is running at roughly 5%.

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