Kirklees residents face not having their bins emptied for at least a week after a union leader said he expected an overwhelming ‘Yes’ vote in a ballot over strike action.
Paul Holmes, Kirklees Unison branch secretary, said Unison members would be balloted on Tuesday, April 17, and he anticipated a “big yes vote” among more than 70 bin collectors.
The row centres around claims of bullying, harassment, intimidation and workers’ inability to take holiday or attend medical appointments in the Kirklees Council department.
Mr Holmes said he expected the strike action, if approved, to take place in late May or early June and would last at least a week to begin with.
He said Kirklees Council has been given legal notification of the action.
Mr Holmes said there was a fundamental problem regarding members being able to take their holidays, claiming that “people being turned down for next year already.”
He added that “if Kirklees said to the binmen you can take your holidays their wouldn’t be a binman to be seen for four months.”
And he claimed members were the victims of “terrible bullying and harassment”, adding: “The unions and management agreed an investigation into many of the issues in November 2017 yet nothing has happened.
“The bin workers have no alternative to strike because of how they are being treated.”
Mr Holmes, who has spent 30 years as Kirklees Unison branch secretary, said: "The results of the ballot will be revealed on Tuesday, May 8.
"The situation has become impossible and my member say they are up for a big one!
"They are not talking about going out for a day, they want it sorting. They have had enough."
He claimed the situation had got so bad that one father of a nine-year-old girl had been unable to take time off, even though he had 12.5 weeks holiday, to be with her after she broke both her arms on a swing. And he said members were struggling to attend medical appointments including cancer tests.
Mr Holmes said: "They are missing medical appointments. It' beyond belief. I have never seen anything like it."
He said there were 10% fewer bin collectors than there were three years ago and there had been a corresponding increase in the number of housing developments being built which led to an increase in bin collections.
A Kirklees Council spokesman said: “The council will not tolerate bullying or harassment and take allegations of this nature very seriously. Any allegations are dealt with through the relevant council procedures.
“We are aware of the concerns raised by some of our employees and, as a result, we have commissioned a review of the cleansing service to make sure we can continue to deliver the best services for our residents.
“We are working closely with union representatives to make sure that all concerns are addressed as part of this review. The review will shortly reach a conclusion and we are confident that by working together we can avoid industrial action and disruption to our residents.”
There has long been a divide between workers and management in the department which stemmed from changes introduced in 2015 for collections over 38 hours in four days – Monday to Thursday.
Fridays are set aside to finish rounds and carry out maintenance, but the days are said to be busier because the rounds are unachieveable in four days.
The dispute came to a head with a ‘wildcat strike’ last November which saw 4,000 bins go uncollected.
Just days before Christmas three refuse collectors were suspended for not clocking off at the depot. Mr Holmes said they had not finished earlier.
