'We don't get paid enough at a job where we're abused daily': Jobcentre security staff strike again

Their union, GMB, says that the Jobcentre workers are 'spat at, stabbed, hit with bottles and threatened with death while doing their job'. A survey of more than 900 workers who are set to walk out reveals staff being savaged in the neck by dogs, punched, attacked with screwdrivers and customers behaving 'like wild animals'.

They describe verbal abuse on a daily basis, including threats to their families, racist and ableist abuse and death threats – one worker even said they had to be driven home because an angry customer was waiting for them outside the Jobcentre.

Staff working at the Wolverhampton branch have already walked out earlier this month, claiming the latest pay increase offer is still too low for a job where they are 'abused on a regular basis' by the public.

The security staff have been in a dispute with G4S – a global security firm – since 2021, and are unsatisfied with the compromises offered to them by the firm after years of negotiating and a multi-billion pound buy-out.

GMB claims the Department for Work and Pensions (DWP) has paid G4S £211 million since December 2022.

Security guards employed by G4S across the UK are set to walk out on May 20 in a 24-hour strike over a real-terms pay cut that has seen 90 per cent of them paid just the minimum wage.

Today national officers from the union are calling on the (DWP) to step in and end the dispute before the next round of strikes on May 28 and 29.

Eamon O'Hearn, GMB national officer, said: "These workers are spat at, stabbed, hit with bottles and threatened with death while doing their job. Yet 90 per cent of them can barely put food on the table – earning just the minimum wage.

"G4S seems incapable of sorting this out; GMB calls on the DWP to step in and ask where the £211 million they've handed over has gone."