I work as a driver for a big supermarkt chain
It's about homeshopping.
People order food online and we bring it to their kitchen.
It's a warehouse with 1,400 workers,
600 of them drivers.
They a re employed and have a company van.
But many other dirvers, like those who work for DPD for example,
are contracted as self-employed entrepreneurs.
The working conditions are relatively safe,
because it is the biggest supermarket chain in the UK.
Wages are low, that is app. £ 8,60 /hour for the drivers,
£ 8 for loading.
£ 7,60 (which is slightly above the minimum wage)
is for those who pick the products in the warehouse.
To drive a van in London is of course very stressful.
But compared to other companies in London which we know,
the condictions are relatively safe.
We've got a small group in the neighbourhood
where we started three years ago.
We publish a workers newspaper.
We started working in bigger warehouses
The first small group we had came from an other supermaket chain.
There where many agency workers there.
The conditions where like this:
you had a zero hours contract,
that meant: no guaranteed shifts.
You had an electronic bracelet that measured your pick rate.
You had to pick 200 items per hour.
If you did not match this pick rate
the next day they would text you to remind you
that your productivity is too low.
Since they hired too many people, they do not give shifts to those people,
whos' productivity is in the lower 20%.
That's why you always have to work hard
for your shifs not to be canceled.
We organized a petition.
The management called everyone in the office,
80,90 colleagues, and said they would do something against it.
In the end we decided to make a slow down for one day, work slower,
because agency workers only get 70% of what permanent staff are paid.
We said: then we only work 70% of our productivity rate.
Yes, we caused some trouble.
But in the end they again called everyone in the office.
And they managed to get rid of us.
We where there for 8 months.
That is longer then most people work there.
It was a collective attempt to achive something after all.
Apart from that, we publish a company newsletter.
Mainly in the readymeal factory.
And we have a solidarity network.
On my workplace, since it is a unionized company,
i just started to get involved with the union stuff.
We are planning to have a newsletter there as well.
A monthly newsletter mainly for the drivers.
But the main thing is that we want to build
a solidarity network where we meet once a week.
In different places. At a McDonalds, in a supermarket cafe
and in a tea house in different neighbourhoods of this district.
We offer people to come with their individual problems.
Many migrants come, many have difficulities in filling out english forms
or in writing a tax return.
Or there are problems with the landlord.
We try and stay in contact with the people we helped.
We hope that we'll be able to mobilize them as supporters when there is a work conflict.
This are our goals at the moment.
There is a lack of being rooted in an area and connected as workers.
In the inner London city the costs for housing have skyrocketed.
It has become very expensive
and there are no big employers exept for the post, or London Underground.
We got in touch with people who work outside, in west London in Heathrow
and we found out that in the disctrict called "western corridor"
connected to Heathrow airport, there are 80,000 workers.
Then we have Park Royal, former production site, now logistics, with 40,000 workers.
And Greenford with 15.000 workers. - A massive number of quite invisible workers.
60% of the food for London is being processed or packed there.
This is an enourmous area for workers, especially young, migrant workers.
We thought we want to get rooted there.
Also under the impression of what warehouse workers in Italy did, the Si Cobas.
Where mostly migrant workers organized and successfully fought for better wages.
We thought: let's start here.
It was clear that it would be difficult: language problems.
English is not the peoples' first language.
We want to remain independent.
There is the union Unite!, that is supposed to be a union for unemployed.
For organizing beyond the workplace.
But mostly in connection with elections and stuff like that.
Party policy of the Labour Party.
It's becoming more and more a place for wannabe Labour candidates
or their supporters who want to mobilize workers for Labour.
We don't want to have too much to do with that sort of things.
We stay away from big politics, and parlamentarism.
But we are really committed to the solidarity network.
It's not only abour helping people induvidually:
with all the attempts to try and bring people into collective struggles,
it often stays at an individual level.
According from what we hear from the solidarity networks in Seattle or Portland in the US,
there is this tendency.
It is important to create a dynamic.
a) to create a solidarity network
b) to reach out to the workplaces in the area.
c) and that is especially important to us: to have a regional newspaper,
that documents the experiences of the network and also from inside the workplaces.
That gives a political direction to the whole thing.
So there are three layers that build the foundation.
Without one of the three the others would not work.
This should create a dynamic.
Do you have a message for your colleagues in Germany?
I think one should just write down or think about the workplace.
Ideally together with other colleagues.
Find a way to spread your experiences and discussions.
Find a forum, start there.
What is happening at your workplace?
What are workers doing,
- even the smallest steps - to become a collective power?
This tends to be ignored by the left as well as by the unions.
Things workers can do on a daily level.
Find a way to communicate about thise day-to-day experiences.
Social media and websites can be helpful,
even though we should try and stay anonymous there.
Share workplace experiences
and experiences about how you can build up pressure from below.
This is a simple idea, but it is a starting point.
And without this everything else hangs in the air.