PROTEST PLIGHT BOLT HIDES FROM WORKERS DEMANDING
SAFETY PROTECTIONS AFTER MURDER OF DRIVER
The United Private Hire Drivers Branch of the Independent Workers’ Union of Great Britain (IWGB) protested on Tuesday 4 May outside Bolt offices in London. Following the murder of Bolt driver Gabriel Bringye while on a job for Bolt in February, drivers have been calling for better safety protections from the app-based operator. This protest follows on from a strike by private hire drivers in March in memory of IWGB member and private hire driv- er Gabriel Bringye, who was murdered on 17 February while working for app- based private hire company Bolt. Later in March, another Bolt driver Muham- mad Alam was also assaulted by passengers while on a Bolt job and had his car stolen at knifepoint. Gabriel’s sister Renata attended the demonstration. She is a single-mother and a private hire driver herself, who has now given up driving for Bolt out of fear. She still works as a private hire driver but only works in daylight hours out of fear for her safety. Gabriel’s fam- ily have received no support from the company aside from written condo- lences and some flowers. A survey of UPHD members found that 71 per cent of drivers had been assault- ed by customers and 82 per cent reported that they had experienced verbal harassment on the job. Drivers have come together as mem- bers of the IWGB to demand Bolt takes meaningful action to tackle assault and abuse against drivers. They are demanding that Bolt updates its app to require stronger identification from customers and also passcode protec- tion on the customer’s app to prevent the use of the app on stolen phones, as is suspected in the attacks on both Gabriel and Muhammad. They also ask for Bolt to take complaints by drivers about abuse more seriously and to pro- vide support after violent instances. Renata Bringye, sister to Gabriel and IWGB member, said: “I am fighting for
JUNE 2021
justice for Gabriel and for Bolt to imple- ment improved safety measures for drivers so that nobody else has to feel the same pain as we have experienced. “Bolt claims to the media they are sup-
porting our family, but this is simply not true. They must act now to ensure nobody else is hurt again. Drivers have spoken loud and clear: the app is not fit for purpose.” Alex Marshall, IWGB President, said: “We know that workers in the ‘gig economy’ are treated as disposable. But it has never been clearer than now - when a driver has been killed and the company thinks they aren’t worth more than a bunch of flowers. “When we came to Bolt’s offices look- ing for answers, they shut up shop and hid. They might be cowards, but we’ll keep coming back until we get justice. We’re not asking for much - just that all workers get enough money to feed their families and are safe doing so.”
BRADFORD CABBIES CONTINUE TO STRIKE OVER CAZ VEHICLE COMPLIANCE
Bradford cabbies’ grievances
Asif Shah, chair of BTAG, told PHTM: The strike action on 13 May achieved its objectives which were to raise aware- ness and cause some amount of disruption to council taxi services. Because of the controversy of being held on Eid day it was a well talked about topic amongst the trade. Now every driver and operator is aware of the issue with Euro 6 diesel compliance for the CAZ being introduced. We had three phases of strikes: the first was designed to cause minimum disrup- tion to the public. Drivers congregated outside City Hall to show the numbers of unhappy drivers. The second phase was the Eid strike, designed to raise awareness of the problems. The third planned strike will be designed to cause maximum disrup- tion. Go slow protests will be held along strategic traffic corridors accross Brad- ford if the council continues to refuse to liaise with us about our concerns.
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