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Chamber and committees

Stop the British Gas Fire

  • Submitted by: Jackie Baillie, Dumbarton, Scottish Labour.
  • Date lodged: Friday, 08 January 2021
  • Motion reference: S5M-23830

That the Parliament understands that British Gas workers will be taking industrial action between 7 and 11 January 2021 as a result of the actions of British Gas owners, Centrica, following its decision in July to commence the firing and rehiring of its 20,000 staff, and forcing them to adopt different terms and conditions; further understands with regret that Centrica issued s188 notices before negotiations had commenced resulting in a breakdown of trust; considers that the changes to conditions for field staff, from those fitting, servicing and repairing boilers and heating systems, to smart metering engineers and electricians, is akin to a zero hours contract with significant insecurity; regrets the proposed changes to working patterns, which it considers will be difficult for those with caring responsibilities to meet; believes that for Centrica to continue to threaten its workforce with fire and rehire is nothing short of bullying, and that changes to contracts should be made with employees and not forced upon them; calls on Centrica to remove this threat from its employees and arrive at a negotiated settlement, and stands in solidarity with the over 1,000 GMB members taking industrial action in Scotland.


Supported by: Neil Bibby, Neil Findlay, Iain Gray, Mark Griffin, Patrick Harvie, Bill Kidd, Monica Lennon (Registered interest) , Lewis Macdonald, Ruth Maguire, Alex Neil, Gil Paterson, Alex Rowley, Elaine Smith, Colin Smyth, David Stewart, Andy Wightman