The workers who clean our hospitals, protect public spaces, run hotels, care for our communities and keep London fed are essential to our city.
Yet too many workers face poverty pay, insecure work, outsourcing, discrimination, union-busting and exploitation linked to their immigration status.
We Keep the City Running is UVW’s campaign to make this essential work visible, challenge exploitation and build the collective power of migrant and working-class workers.
Get involved:
Share our stories and wins. Help put migrant workers’ organising, struggles and victories on the agenda and shift the conversation from “migrant vulnerability” to workers’ rights, collective power and change.
Join the mobilisation. March, organise and build solidarity with workers across London.
Help build the evidence. Support UVW’s research, including the Migrant Worker Exploitation Report and work towards a Migrant Essential Worker Charter.
Join us:
- 4 October: Cable Street 90th anniversary march — UVW will help lead the march.
- 18 December: International Migrants Day — Workers’ Forum and campaign mobilisation.
Workers keep London running. Now we organise to make it work for us.
To find out more email us here >>
Our demands
- Outsourced workers to be brought in-house, ending the race to the bottom on pay and conditions.
- A Migrant Essential Worker Charter guaranteeing decent pay, sick pay, holidays, pensions, safe workplaces, protection from discrimination and union rights.
- A real right to organise, with public bodies refusing contracts to employers with established records of union-busting or unlawful anti-union practices.
- Firewalls between work and immigration enforcement, so workers can report exploitation without fear.
- Public money not funding exploitation, with stronger employment standards built into public procurement.
- A London-wide standard ensuring the workers who keep London running can live, work safely and organise with dignity.
The City of London belongs to the workers: cleaners take direct action and win
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