by Clare Doyle
Friday 12 December saw another week of strike action at the world famous British Library come to a noisy conclusion. More than 300 members of the Public and Civil Service Union (PCS) have been on strike again, after being offered just 3.8% which, as branch chair Nick Alen said, “does not even keep up with the rise in the Retail Price Index.”
“Last time we took strike action”, he reminds us, “one of the top managers — newly appointed Rebecca Lawrence — left the post before the strike was over! We also know that Jeremy Silver, on the board since 2019, gets no less than a six-figure salary.”
Pickets at the staff entrance made plenty of noise, with their vuvuzelas and their music system blaring out. Drivers of buses, lorries, cars and taxis were constantly hooting as they drove past. The pickets responded with cheers and waves and extra loud blasts on their vuvuzelas.
“We do like to make a lot of noise out here!” Nick smiles. “At work, of course, it’s a different matter. Management are trying to do our jobs and they have agency staff on the doors, but we understand all the reading rooms are inoperative.”
One picket was carrying a cardboard poster with a hand-drawn cartoon of Bob Cratchet and Ebenezer Scrooge, with the message: ‘Consider not giving presents this holiday season – BL health and well-being advice.’
“It’s all a bit of a pantomime!” Nick exclaimed. “We will see after this whether management will get round the table with us. But unless they agree on at least our main demands we could well be out here again in the New Year.”