G4S strike at St George’s Hospital on 1st November

GMB members working for G4S Patient Transport at St George’s Hospital in Tooting are to strike next Tuesday (1 November) over poor pay and conditions relative to other workers at the site.

The workers, represented by GMB, the union for workers in the NHS, rejected a last minute offer from G4S and St George’s NHS Trust. The deal failed to put the workers on a similar footing with other Patient Transport drivers in the area, or with other NHS workers at St George’s.

GMB considers that St George’s NHS Trust has allowed pay and conditions, as well as the quality of the Patient Transport service for patients, to decline with a succession of private sector contractors. Patient transport services are a vital part of the NHS, delivering vulnerable patients to key hospital appointments that they may not otherwise be able to attend.

G4S has responded to the pay dispute by suspending both of GMB’s workplace reps from work and attempting to negotiate directly with workers.

The picket will start at 6am with the main concentration from 8am on Tuesday 1st November. The details are as follows:

St George’s Hospital
Effort Street Entrance
Tooting
SW17 0QR

Kieron Merrett, GMB Regional Organiser, said, “G4S must now reinstate GMB’s workplace reps and come back to the negotiating table, with a deal which ends the undervaluing of G4S workers at St George’s Hospital.

Meanwhile, St George’s NHS Trust must not continue outsourcing vital services for patients to the lowest bidder, simply to allow pay and conditions and service quality to spiral.

The G4S workers at St George’s Hospital are the only workers at St George’s who do not receive NHS pay and conditions. They are paid significantly less than other patient transport workers, including those employed by G4S in other local hospitals.

Like many NHS Trusts, St George’s is in significant financial difficulties. But it must not force the lowest paid workers, or the most vulnerable patients, to bear the brunt of the NHS cuts.”