Felixstowe workers vote 92% in favour of industrial action after Unite union rejected 5% pay rise

Dockers at the UK’s largest container port have voted overwhelmingly to strike after they were offered a below-inflation pay rise in the latest industrial dispute sparked by the cost of living crisis to bring national transport infrastructure to a halt.

Workers at the port of Felixstowe in Suffolk balloted 92% in favour of a strike next month, rejecting a 5% pay rise offer from the Felixstowe Dock and Railway Company which their union, Unite, said would be a real-terms pay cut with retail price inflation standing at 11.8%.

“Workers should not be paying the price for the pandemic with a pay cut,” said the Unite general secretary, Sharon Graham. “Unite has undertaken 360 disputes in a matter of months and we will do all in our power to defend workers.”

A spokesperson for the port company, which handles 2,000 ships a year, said: “The company made what we believe to be a very fair offer and we are disappointed with the result of the ballot. The union has agreed to our request to meet with Acas next week and we hope that any industrial action can be avoided.”

Its workers’ plan to strike came as a senior union leader predicted rolling strikes across the economy for the rest of the year beginning with a “summer of solidarity”, as workers become emboldened to vote for industrial action in the face of rising living costs.

Simon Weller, the assistant general secretary of the train drivers union Aslef and a national council member of the Trades Union Congress, said strike ballots planned by civil servants and teachers alongside more strikes already planned by college staff and across the rail network – starting with train drivers walking out at seven operators on Saturday – would increase “organic momentum”.

At the AQA exam board, 180 staff are due to stage a 72-hour strike starting on Friday after their employer failed to reopen talks over pay, said Unison, their union. They had been offered a 3% pay rise. At BT, 40,000 workers will strike on Friday and Saturday, affecting maintenance and the rollout of telecoms infrastructure, and more than 100,000 Royal Mail workers have voted to strike, though their union has not named a date.

After Wednesday’s rail – worker strikes crippled the network across Great Britain, train drivers will also strike at nine rail companies on 13 August, in a move dismissed by the Rail Delivery Group of train operators as “a cynical approach to talks, a total disregard for passengers and putting everyone’s summer plans at risk”. Members of the National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers (RMT) working for Network Rail and 14 train operators are planning strikes on 18 and 20 August alongside members of the Transport Salaried Staffs’ Association (TSSA) at Avanti West Coast. The RMT has announced a strike on London Underground on 19 August.

Weller dismissed suggestions the TUC would call a general strike, which Mick Lynch, the general secretary of the RMT, said on Wednesday he would campaign for. But Weller said: “There is going to be a summer and autumn of industrial action in multiple sectors as workers in all of these sectors say enough is enough. It is going to gain momentum.”

Coordinated action, with strikes by different unions in the same sector on the same day or different sectors on sequential days to keep the pay demands in the public eye for longer, are also likely, said union sources. But mass politicised stoppages across industries are unlikely, since each strike needs to be based on a specific dispute with an employer to be legal.

After the Labour leader, Keir Starmer, sacked the shadow transport minister Sam Tarry for giving an unauthorised broadcast interview while on an RMT picket line on Wednesday, there were signs of a widening divide in the opposition over how to respond to the strikes.

John McDonnell, the shadow chancellor under Jeremy Corbyn’s leadership of the party, called for “coordinated action”.

“If you look at the ballots that are taking place across the trade union movement, we are talking about millions of workers now voting for industrial action,” he said.

“So, naturally, what people are saying as well [is]: ‘Why not coordinate that?’ Well, I support coordinated action, because if that results in a decent pay rise for people, they are protected against the cost of living crisis. I think that’s the most effective thing to do.”