Injustice at Work: How Britain's Low-paid Non-unionised Employees Experience Workplace Problems

Anna Pollert

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DOI: 10.2190/WR.13.3.b

Abstract

This article examines the experience of non-unionised, lower-paid workers in Britain who have suffered individual grievances at work. This is contextualised in the decline in collective industrial relations and conflict, the rise in individual workplace grievances, and the tortuous process of legally enforcing employment rights. The first part of the analysis draws on a regionally representative survey, the Unrepresented Worker Survey, conducted in 2004, of 501 low-paid, non-unionised workers with problems at work. The second part uses qualitative research based on 50 in-depth interviews with a further sample of workers who sought help with employment problems from Citizens Advice, the major British charity that helps people with a range of individual, including employment, problems. The article demonstrates that although non-unionised workers are far from passive when faced with problems at work, their attempts to resolve grievances fail for the majority. Britain's predominantly individualised industrial relations do not deliver a fair and effective system of workplace conflict resolution for workers.

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