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2025 Birmingham bin strike
Industrial action over pay in the garbage disposal industry From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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The 2025 Birmingham bin strike is an ongoing standoff between striking refuse workers and Birmingham City Council in Birmingham, England.[1] The workers, represented by Unite the Union, began their strike on 11 March 2025 after a dispute with the city council over its proposed pay cuts and elimination of Waste Recycling and Collection Officer (WRCO) roles.[1][2]
According to the union, approximately 150 to 170 of its members are facing pay cuts of up to £8,000 annually, with hundreds more losing out on pay progression.[1][2] The union also argues that the WRCO is important to health and safety.[1] According to Birmingham City Council, only 17 workers would be affected; the impact on pay would be far less; and all those affected by the elimination of the WRCO role have been offered other roles for equivalent pay, training as large goods vehicle (LGV) drivers, or voluntary redundancy payouts.[2] The council also says that the WRCO role does not exist at other councils, and that retaining the role opens it up to equal pay claims, since it is performed mainly by men.[1]
In March 2025, the Birmingham City Council declared a major incident after 17,000 tonnes of rubbish were left uncollected on the streets.[3] The city council has called on other local authorities to assist with clearing the backlog of rubbish.[4] In April, the British government called in Army specialists, including office-based military planners, to provide logistical support for the council, rather than deploying soldiers.[4][5] In July, Unite announced it would review its relationship with the governing Labour Party after the government and Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner expressed their support for the council over the strikers.[6][7]
Media reporting has indicated that different areas of the city have been impacted by the strike to different extents, with lower income inner city areas such as Sparkhill, Balsall Heath, Small Heath, Sparkbrook and Ladywood suffering from the piling up of refuse to a greater degree than more affluent suburbs like Harborne and Edgbaston, replicating a pattern seen in the city's previous bin strike in 2017. Rachel Adams, a researcher at the University of Birmingham's Health Services Management Centre, suggested that factors contributing to this include differences in population density, access to transport and distance to waste disposal sites. Some residents of poorer areas also claimed that their localities were also used for flytipping by people from elsewhere, and that wealthier areas were being prioritised for refuse collection rounds.[8][9] Specific reasons behind the disparity, such as (as is true in other cases) people in wealthier areas being more likely to complain,[10] are not yet substantiated in this case.
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Megapickets
On 9 May 2025, a "megapicket" by members of other trade unions was organised at Lifford Lane Depot in solidarity with the striking workers.[11] Speakers included Mick Whelan, General Secretary of ASLEF, Steve Wright, General Secretary of the Fire Brigades Union, and Daniel Kebede, General Secretary of the National Education Union.[12] The action was co-ordinated by Strike Map[13].
On 25 July 2025, Strike Map coordinated a second megapicket[14] across the five sites of Atlas Depot, Lifford Lane Depot, Perry Barr Depot, Ryton site in Coventry and Veolia Incinerator.[15] Speakers included Fran Heathcote, General Secretary of PCS, Steve Wright, General Secretary of the Fire Brigades Union, and Jeremy Corbyn, MP for Islington North.[16]
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Angela Rayner's suspension from Unite
On 11 July 2025 at Unite the Union's policy conference a vote was passed to suspend Deputy Prime Minister Angela Rayner's membership over her handling of the bin strike in Birmingham.[17][18][19]. However Rayner has insisted that she wasn't a member of Unite at that time[20].
Cost to Birmingham City Council
A Birmingham City Council report put the cost of the industrial action at £14,000,000[21].
Inaccuracy of equal pay claim figure
On 15 October 2025 the Birmingham Mail reported that the figure for Birmingham City Council's equal pay settlement was a fraction of the figure of £760 million that was originally claimed[22]. In response to this Sharon Graham stated "The ongoing bin strike is a direct result of the council’s mismanagement of its finances. Unite has repeatedly provided the council with expert legal advice to demonstrate it was making the wrong calculations on equal pay, but the council was too arrogant to even consider it"[23].
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See also
References
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