YOU ONLY have to walk down any high street to see how the retail sector has been affected by the pandemic.
Almost one in five Welsh shops now stand empty and many retail jobs across Wales remain under threat.
The Covid-19 crisis has heightened the difficulties facing retail and a recovery plan is urgently needed to ensure that our high streets survive this crisis.
We welcome the support provided by the Welsh Labour government through the Economic Resilience Fund, but there are key structural issues to address to support the retail sector’s recovery.
If any other industry faced this level of upheaval, there would quite rightly be a public outcry and Westminster government action, but that is not the case with retail.
THE government must “stop dithering” and deliver on its promises to boost employment rights, the TUC said yesterday as a new poll revealed that Britain’s workers want urgent action.
On the eve of International Workers’ Day, the union confederation published a survey showing that a huge majority of working people want the same basic rights for all and that most want an end to the scourge of zero-hours contracts.
The poll of more than 2,500 workers, carried out for the TUC by GQR Research, suggests that 84 per cent want to see a raft of basic rights applied to all.
Many workers, especially in the gig economy, are not covered even by the limited existing safeguards such as minimum notice periods, protection against unfair dismissal and the right to request flexible working.
But unions said they are concerned that employers will attempt to block or dilute its proposals.
German unions have have been campaigning for a supply chain law to strengthen the human rights due diligence obligations of German companies.
With the German government now on the verge of passing this law, big business is attempting to undermine it.
Joerg Hofmann of the 2.5 million-strong IG Metall union said: “After a long struggle, and with the support of the trade union movement, we have succeeded in achieving a Bill that will oblige companies to take responsibility for what happens in their supply chains, making global trade fairer. If companies fail to meet their human rights obligations, trade unions and NGOs will be able to sue them in German courts.”
UNITE accused coffee giant Jacobs Douwe Egberts (JDE) today of planning to prevent workers from taking summer holidays in a bid to undermine an overtime ban in an ongoing fire-and-rehire dispute.
The union said that bosses at the JDE factory in Banbury, Oxfordshire, had sent a letter to staff setting out conditions for applications for leave, which may be refused if production is at risk.
Unite branded the move an “underhand ploy” to weaken support for a continuous overtime ban announced earlier this month and due to start on May 1.
On April 16, members also voted to strike after the Dutch-owned company issued notice of dismissal and re-engagement to 291 employees. Walkouts are expected in June if bosses do not back down.
Editorial: In a pandemic, job security is a matter of life and death Deliveroo riders from the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB) in the City of London, as they go on strike in a dispute for fair pay, safety protections and basic workers rights on April 7
SHOCKING new figures from the TUC reveal job security as a matter of life and death.
Lacking employment rights such as sick pay, workers on zero or short-hours contracts are more likely to have to continue working when sick exposing their colleagues to infection.
They are paid less, reducing the likelihood that they have savings to fall back on which has the same effect.