No one takes strike action lightly – and dock workers are no exception. For the first time in 30 years, dock workers at Felixstowe in Suffolk, the UK’s largest container port, are downing tools because they have no other choice.

The nearly 2,000 workers employed by Felixstowe Dock and Railway Company, members of Unite, took eight days of all-out strike action from August 21 in a fight for their livelihoods as inflation soars to unprecedented levels, slashing their take home pay to the bone. Some of the workers, which include crane drivers, machine operators, stevedores and others, earn as little as £20,000 a year and many are struggling to get by. One tug driver, who wished to remain anonymous, told of how he’s been forced to resort to food banks to feed his children, noting that the situation has “got worse and worse and worse by the minute”. “I’m now down to like £4 in my bank account this week, but we’ve got shoes to buy, a school uniform to buy,” he told ITV News.

What the striking Unite members are asking for – a pay rise roughly in line with inflation – is a drop in the bucket for the Felixstowe Dock and Railway Company, which is extremely profitable. Forensic research carried out by Unite revealed that the company, according to its most recent accounts, made pre-tax profits of £61m in 2020, when it also paid out £99m in dividends. Since 2017 the company has paid out £198m in dividends most of which have gone to parent companies, with the ultimate holding company being CK Hutchinson Holdings Ltd, which is registered in Hong Kong and is the world’s biggest port owner and developer. Addressing workers on the picket line on the fourth day of strike action, Unite general secretary Sharon Graham said, “The company [Felixstowe Ports] is making an absolute fortune. It could pay 50 per cent more on your wages and still be in profit. We are asking for 10 per cent. What is the problem? “The company need to come clean and open the books about their untold billions.” Graham vowed that striking members at Felixstowe would have “Unite’s full backing until this dispute is resolved” as she pledged to turn the union’s force on exposing CK Hutchison. Sharon Graham said, “Every single client, every investor, every decision maker at CK Hutchison is being looked into. “I will be inviting the shareholders at CK Hutchison, the clients of CK Hutchison, the decision makers of CK Hutchison to meetings with me, to open the books on what is going on. The company refusal to settle the union claim is about corporate greed.”