Amazon workers strike in Germany and UK amid “Black Friday”

Several hundred Amazon workers are on strike in Germany and the United Kingdom on Friday in the middle of Black Friday, one of the business’s annual highlights, as part of a long-running pay dispute with their management.

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“More than 1,000 people went on strike (Friday) and at the peak of the walkout this morning we had more than 800 picketing at one time,” union spokesman Stuart Richards told AFP. British told GMB.

The sprawling Coventry site supplies “other warehouses and we have no doubt this strike will have a strong impact,” Amazon said during Black Friday, the Friday of promotions that follows the US Thanksgiving holiday. Richards Mr.

According to GMB, the Coventry site employs around 2,300 people.

In Germany, a movement for “better wages and working conditions” was launched early on Friday at the call of the Verdi trade union.

About five of the twenty warehouses operated by Amazon in Germany – in Leipzig, Rheinberg, Dortmund, Bad Herzfeld and Koblenz, or in five regions – where the packages are manufactured before the route.

Unions believe Black Friday will be the biggest day of strikes in Amazon’s notoriously anti-union history, but the US giant says the walkout won’t have a major impact on its operations.

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According to an Amazon spokesperson in Germany, “Customers can count on reliable and timely deliveries as usual.” According to him, employees already benefit from “reasonable salaries and attractive social benefits”.

The starting hourly wage within Amazon is 14 euros, according to the group, and 12 euros for the German “smik”.

More than half of Amazon’s employees in Germany have worked there for more than 5 years, an Amazon spokeswoman said.

German union Verdi bases its demands on the retail sector’s collective agreement, which American refuses to join.

“Collective agreements are the only binding protection for employees against corporate arbitrariness,” Silke Zimmer, Verdi’s head of retail, said in a statement.

The first strike at Amazon in Germany was ten years ago. According to the union, mobilization spread and made it possible to obtain better working conditions.

In the United Kingdom, Mr. According to Richards, the American giant refuses to talk to the strikers, but the unionist assures that almost a year of social movement led by the GMB has led to large numbers “giving Amazon pay rises”. of employees.

According to the GMB, this falls short of the strikers’ demands, which are wages of £15 an hour compared to the £12 they have received so far.

An Amazon spokesperson contacted by AFP in the United Kingdom confirmed that the group “regularly reviews its salaries.[ils offraient] Competitive wages and benefits.

He added, “By April, [leur] The minimum wage will rise to £12.30 or £13 depending on site, an increase of 20% in two years and 50% since 2018.

American “Black Friday” has been exported to Europe and beyond, with physical and online stores offering significant discounts to kick off the Christmas gift season.