Work

The law judges this on a case-by-case basis.

Walk down locked and empty streets alone,
arrive for start of shift, it's bear-the-brunt time
to serve some others' families not your own
Going from the home front to the frontline

Frozen pay, now tiny, ice-cold 'offers', 
red-bordered bills alert approaching deadline
The firing line ignites key workers' coffers
Going from the frontline to the breadline

after Gershwin's song from Porgy and Bess

---

Summertime 

and the cost of livin' ain't easy

Bills are jumpin'

and prices are high

Oh, the bosses are rich

and the workers are strugglin'

But hush, little baby

don't you cry

One of these mornin's,

you're going to wake up strikin'

Jeremy Westlake

has the second best take

He's in charge of the cash

and makes sure he gets a big stash

Andrew Haines

carefully explains

That his £593,000 pay is not a perk -

He really is worth twenty of the people who do the actual work

---

*Chief Executive Officer of Network Rail

A poem about this

Nicky from Network Rail
says that to get work and not fail
to make yourself a mint,
not be skint
- come on, take the hint -

Pompous & Opulent
Prosperous & Ostentatious
Profiteering & On-the-take

Parsimonious & Obstinate
Penny-pinching & 'Orrible
Private & Obscene

Perfidious & Odious
Poisonous & Objectionable
Punishing & Oppressive

Petition & Organise
Protest & Outrage
Picket & Occupy

Public & Ownership.

The TUC's Disabled Members' Committee has made this statement: Accessible public transport is essential for disabled people to participate in society on an equal and independent basis. To be genuinely accessible, public transport must be adequately staffed by workers with decent standards of training, pay, conditions and security of employment.

Janine's opening remarks at the TUC Disabled Workers' Conference panel discussion on Accessibility As Standard Not 'As Required': building accessible workplaces for all, on Monday 21 March 2022.

Which is better?

A. A wheelchair user arrives at their new workplace, enters it and starts work.

Janine's contribution to the debate on shiftwork at TUC Women's Conference 2022.

Read the text here.