Unite can confirm that workers at the Village Hotel in Glasgow are being balloted on strike action in an escalating dispute over pay, paid breaks and working conditions. 

Around 90 per cent of the food and beverage workforce are involved in the dispute which follows the refusal of Village Hotels management to negotiate over improved pay, contracts, and conditions.  

The ballot opened this week and closes on 15 July. If a strike mandate is achieved it will be the first strike action at a major hotel in over 40 years.  The workers are demanding equal pay for everyone regardless of age starting at the real living wage of £12.60, paid breaks for everyone, and backdated wages for those under 21-years at the same rate as fellow workers in Village Edinburgh - who are paid significantly more for the same roles.  

Unite members at Village Hotels in Glasgow had requested a direct say in how their pay and conditions are determined but were rebuked in a shocking letter from Village Hotels General Counsel, Kelli Turner, openly stating to Unite that the company was "very comfortable with our pay structure and employment terms more generally, and at this stage we have no plans to pay all employees the real living wage or to provide paid breaks.  We know that we are not alone in this approach which is one often adopted across the hospitality sector." 

Sharon Graham, Unite general secretary, said: “Senior management at Village Hotels openly boast that they remain determined to exploit workers by refusing to pay the wages and conditions they deserve. 

“Village Hotels is promoting in-work poverty and a poor working environment alongside undermining basic employment law in the sole pursuit of profit. Unite will back our members all the way in fighting back against such Victorian standards set by Village Hotels.”  

Workers at Village in Glasgow have already won a backdated pay rise after it was discovered by Unite reps that there had been a significant wage disparity that disproportionately affected young women, as well as backdated pay for unpaid training over a period of up to two years.  

Bryan Simpson, national lead for Unite hospitality, said: “Village Hotel workers deserve the real living wage, they deserve paid breaks and the right to have their union collectively bargaining for improved working conditions. 

“The hospitality sector is notorious for its exploitative and precarious practices. The approach by Village management towards its workforce - which is to hide behind a race to the bottom - is scandalous.”   

ENDS 

Notes to Editor 

For media enquiries please contact Bryan Simpson on 07891 118390 or bryan.simpson@unitetheunion.org Unite Scotland is the country’s biggest and most diverse trade union with around 150,000 members. The union is led in Scotland by Derek Thomson.