Ross Saunders, who attended the picketline in Merthyr Tydfil, pictured, reported, "RPE Engineers are striking against changes to grading management are trying to impose. A resounding 86% of members voted in favour of strike action on a colossal 94% turnout which smashed throught the thresholds imposed by the Tory anti-union laws. RPE workers do important work making changes to the network to connect large-scale construction projects like the one at Prince Charles Hospital. Amongst the changes management wants to impose are the replacement of automatic pay progression with bonus payments which could be withdrawn at management's discretion. The changes are part of a general assault on the pay and conditions of the whole BT Openreach workforce. 
The CWU is to ballot all 40,000 Openreach workers for action against office closure plans and cuts to entitlements. A phenomenal 7000 workers attended an online meeting organised by the union on the 10th March.
Ross said, "All ordinary working-class people will back the efforts of these strikers to fight off plans by the bosses to cut their conditions as part of a general attempt to cut the share going to workers. Just like the British Gas workers who have taken action against the company's "fire and rehire" plans, this is a business that has boomed during the pandemic. Bosses are as usual trying to boost profits at workers' expense. Both companies should be nationalised under democratic control of the workers. So should the whole communications sector and the utilities too. Now that Labour has been recaptured by big business, workers will have to build a new party to make that programme a reality."
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