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Whitehall workers to take strike action on Truss or Sunak's first day as prime minister

Cleaners, security guards, reception workers, post and porterage staff to walk out over health & safety and other entitlements

PCS union members in Whitehall have voted to take strike action on what will be the first day in office for the new prime minister.

Rishi Sunak or Liz Truss will become premier on September 7 as cleaners, security guards, reception workers, post and porterage staff walk out in Whitehall over health and safety and other entitlements.

The PCS members are employed on an outsourced contract by ISS to keep the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy facilities running.

The action begins on September 5 and 6, but some shift workers will be continuing the action into the early hours of September 7.

Members voted by 94 per cent on a nearly 77 per cent turnout to take action.

The workers took industrial action last year which led to their union agreeing new health and safety protocols with the employer.

The new protocols were designed to protect workers during the Covid pandemic and beyond, including site-specific risk assessments, health and safety training for managers and supervisors and future consultation with PCS reps.

PCS claims ISS has not kept to the agreement.

The workers are also in dispute to ensure ISS staff receive bank holiday entitlements and their employer deals effectively with pay errors.

PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: “For the new Prime Minister to face strike action on their first day at work is a sign of things to come.

“Our members all across the Civil Service are increasingly angry and desperate as the government does nothing to ease the cost-of-living crisis.”

Mr Serwotka added: “While the candidates for prime minister pitch increasingly right-wing ideas to Conservative Party members, our own members – the people the new prime minister will rely on to get their work done – are facing a winter of real hardship.”

“ISS remains in an ongoing, constructive dialogue with the PCS and we hope for a swift resolution to this dispute.”

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