- Conference
- 2025 Water, Environment & Transport Conference
- Date
- 13 February 2025
- Decision
- Carried
Conference notes some of the heartfelt motions put forward at previous National Delegate Conferences (NDC) and as fellow human beings we can’t help but be moved by some of the harrowing stories of abuse and upset our members face on a daily basis.
Migrant workers are too often the victims of exploitation including bad employment practices like the illegal deduction of wages, high agency fees, not paying the minimum wage, trade union victimisation and inadequate health and safety. This is sadly more common in our non-regulated employers such as external contractors.
As our WET branches continue to grow in terms of membership it is vital this service group is not left behind. We have seen our colleagues in Health produce some excellent service group specific literature to help branches and forcing rogue employers to banish bad practices. Conference, there is no better time than now to join in this fight to protect our colleagues and friends by producing something service group specific. Each service group has their own challenges, and we must reflect the challenges our sectors face with this motion.
Therefore, conference asks the WET SGE to:
1)Work with UNISON’s migrant worker network to produce a guide for branches when bargaining on policies, to have them include migrant workers and what employers can do to protect them at work.
2)Look at good practice across the other service groups and what can be shared with branches within WET.
3)Consider creating a WET specific migrant worker charter for employers to sign up, which should include but not be limited to;
a)Ensuring workplace risk assessments are up to date to include migrant workers’ rights.
b)Work with recruitment teams to ensure migrant worker applicants are not disadvantaged.
c)Ensuring migrant workers are paid fairly in line with the role and responsibilities and not under the national minimum wage.
d)Anything else the SGE would find relevant to the charter.