Dozens of council officers and managers responsible for running Bristol’s housing services walked out on strike on Friday (October 21) - saying their workloads are ‘unsustainable’ and the housing department at the council is ‘in crisis’.
Around 50 housing officers, mainly from the Unite union but also from the Unison union, were picketing on Friday outside the council’s offices at 100 Temple Street, after walking out on strike in protest at the way council chiefs are running the housing department.
They will also strike today (Monday, October 24), and say they are a ‘broken service with a broken staff’ and council chiefs have done nothing about their issues. Bristol City Council say they are ‘disappointed’ at the strike but they are carrying out an ‘essential modernisation’ of the service, which means changes.
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The housing department workers say they are enduring ‘terrible working conditions’, with ‘unsustainable workloads’, managing the council’s 27,000 council housing tenancies, with a 64 per cent increase in the number of cases involving vulnerable tenants over the last year, which has placed them ‘under enormous strain’.
They say there simply aren’t enough of them to cope, and they say they are ‘angry that the council is refusing to act’, even though the extra workload is ‘causing high rates of stress and anxiety’. Their strike action is demanding the council reduces workloads on individual housing officers and team leaders and allocate extra resources to the department.
One housing officer, who asked to remain anonymous, said: “The reduction in services due to austerity has significantly increased our workloads. We feel like support workers sometimes rather than housing officers. We are a broken service with a broken staff.”
Unite’s regional officer Joseph Murphy said: “Instead of working with front-line housing staff to properly prioritise workloads, the council’s senior managers have failed to act.
"Bristol council’s housing department is in crisis. The leadership must reduce workloads and provide the resources necessary for it to function properly,” he added. Unite said the council’s senior management have ‘continually failed to accept or even acknowledge this reality and the need for the service to adapt’.
Unite’s general secretary Sharon Graham said: “Our members have had enough of the intolerable demands that they are being subjected to. Levels of stress and anxiety have rocketed. The workers are absolutely right to take a stand against these unsustainable workloads and they have Unite’s full backing during these strikes. Bristol council needs to act now.” The workers have seen a 64 per cent increase in the number of cases involving vulnerable tenants over the last year, which has placed them under enormous strain.
A spokesperson from Bristol City Council said: “Housing demands have changed dramatically in recent years. As a result, we need to change and we are re-designing our housing service to ensure we are equipped to provide the best support we can for our tenants. We have been working closely with the unions and our workforce and while we are disappointed there is a strike during those discussions, we will continue to include our staff as we carry out the essential modernisation of the service.”
Read next:
- Bristol housing chief branded 'a traitor' as he's booted out of community union he used to lead
- Renters fight back tears as they tell of trauma of Bristol housing crisis at unofficial 'commission'
- Top council lawyer claims ‘no systematic monitoring’ of social media of SEND parents
- Three quarters of Bristol SEND parents say council 'doesn't have their child's interests at heart'
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