Sign the petition against low paid key workers facing hardship this Christmas

Mitie members are facing 7 weeks without pay and having their benefit payments disrupted or stopped in the run up to Christmas because their new employer has decided to change their pay date and frequency.

Outsourced cleaners, catering, maintenance and facilities staff employed at the Cabinet Office, Downing Street, Foreign and Commonwealth Office and the Canary Wharf civil service hub by Mitie are facing this when their employment transfers to outsourcing giants ISS and OCS on 1 November.

Sign the petition to ISS, OCS and government decision makers calling on them to intervene and drop these unfair plans.  

UK law is designed to protect an employee’s contract of employment when they transfer to a new employer but:

  • ISS plan to change the pay frequency of 'frontline' staff from monthly to fortnightly.
  • OCS plan to change “frontline” staff’s pay date to the 14th of each month, resulting in a 7 week wait until they are paid on the 14 December.

These plans will plunge the lowest paid staff in government offices into unnecessary debt and financial hardship during a cost-of-living crisis and just before Christmas. Many staff who rely on Universal Credit will have their payments disrupted and even stopped due to the change of pay frequency.

The law also requires the Government Property Agency, the public body responsible for these contracts to consider how ISS’s and OCS’s plans affect staff with protected characteristics as part of their Public Sector Equality Duty obligations. With less than a week before the transfer the equality impact is yet to be assessed. 

Sign the petition to support these essential workers and oppose these unnecessary changes. Support them to demand fair treatment and not to be treated less favourably to ISS’s and OCS’s white-collar staff. 

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