FILE PHOTO: The emblem of Amazon is seen on the firm’s logistics centre in Boves, France, October 6, 2021 REUTERS/Pascal Rossignol/File Photo
| Photo Credit: Reuters
Workers and activists throughout Europe plan demonstrations in opposition to U.S. e-commerce large Amazon on November 24, aiming to disrupt its warehouses and stop merchandise from reaching Amazon parcel lockers on one of many busiest procuring days of the yr.
On Black Friday, the day after the U.S. Thanksgiving vacation, many retailers slash costs to spice up gross sales. Originally identified for crowds lining up at big-box shops in the U.S., the occasion has more and more moved on-line and gone international, fuelled in half by Amazon, which advertises ten days of vacation reductions this yr from November 17 to November 27.
In Germany, Amazon’s second-biggest market by gross sales in 2022, staff at 5 fulfilment centres in Bad Hersfeld, Dortmund, Koblenz, Leipzig, and Rheinberg, will go on strike for twenty-four hours from midnight on Thursday to demand a collective wage settlement, commerce union Verdi stated.
An Amazon spokesperson in Germany stated staff are paid truthful wages, with a beginning wage of greater than 14 euros ($15.27) an hour, and have extra advantages, including that deliveries of Black Friday orders can be dependable and well timed. [$1 = 0.9168 euros]
More than 1,000 staff at Amazon’s warehouse in Coventry, England, will strike on Friday, in keeping with commerce union GMB, as a part of a long-running dispute over pay. Trade unionists are additionally organising an indication at Amazon’s UK headquarters in London. An Amazon U.Ok. spokesperson stated the strike wouldn’t trigger any disruption.
Amazon’s parcel lockers are additionally being focused. Many Amazon consumers use its lockers, that are positioned in practice stations, grocery store automobile parks, and road corners, to obtain their orders.
In France, anti-globalisation organisation Attac is encouraging activists to plaster them with posters and ticker tape, probably blocking supply staff and clients from with the ability to open them.
Attac, which calls Black Friday a “celebration of overproduction and overconsumption”, stated it expects the protest to be wider than final yr, when it estimates 100 Amazon lockers throughout France have been focused.
Italian commerce union CGIL referred to as for a Black Friday strike on the Castel San Giovanni warehouse, whereas Spanish union CCOO referred to as for Amazon warehouse and supply staff to stage a one-hour strike on every shift on “Cyber Monday”, the final day of Amazon’s ten-day sale.
“Make Amazon Pay”, a worldwide marketing campaign coordinated by UNI Global Union, stated strikes and protests would happen in greater than 30 international locations from Black Friday via to Monday.
