THE LEADER of Amazon’s first union has urged gig workers in Britain to unite in a global fight against multi-billionaire Jeff Bezos.

Former rapper Chris Smalls, who led the unionisation drive in New York, spoke out in support of Amazon workers in Coventry, who are locked in a dispute with the corporation.

Black workers are twice as likely to be in the gig economy, according to figures from the Trades Union Congress, and picket line protests in Coventry show that Amazon workers in the city are majority-Black.

Speaking this morning at a Unison event in London as part of the union’s Year of Black Workers, Smalls said: “The one thing that brings us all together is that Amazon is always the enemy.

“And the work-related issues are the same in different countries. They exploit people. People get injured every day. People get hurt every day. People even die, and we do not hear about it.

“Amazon does that worldwide, no matter where we are at. It’s the same struggle; the same fight. And this is why I’m here in the UK, to make sure that these connections are amplified together as one, building that international solidarity.”

Smalls said he was shocked to hear Amazon workers in Britain were on £10 an hour, saying that Americans were on twice that amount but were still fighting for a better deal to feed their families.

He led worker efforts at an Amazon warehouse in Staten Island, New York, in April, and first visited Coventry workers in February to tell them about what tactics worked in the US.

Unionised Amazon workers in the US say they have faced unprecedented union-busting efforts from the company, an accusation the company denies, and point to a huge amount of evidence from managers trying to convince workers that a union will harm what rights they have to firing workers who join a union.

In Coventry, 500 Amazon workers in Coventry, who are members of the GMB union, took part in a walk out in April to contest poor hourly pay and unfavourable working conditions.

Action for workers rights in Amazon has been spreading since 2018, when workers in Germany and Spain protested against their treatment.

Global unionisation in the gig economy marks an important development for people-power in an industry that thrives on the atomisation of delivery drivers and classifies them as self-employed, meaning workers have little rights such as sick leave or holiday and have to pay their own tax.

At the TUC’s Black Workers Conference last weekend, delegates paid tribute to Wilf Sullivan, who is retiring after more than 30 years as a full time union official, the last 18 of which he has been the TUC’s race equality officer.

An emotional Sullivan said he had been inspired by Bill Morris, who was the first Black union general secretary when he took over at the TGWU (now Unite) in 1986. “Bill had campaigned against Margaret Thatcher’s anti-asylum seeker legislation, which shows things don’t necessarily change, it just happens in other forms.”

He added: “When we talk about institutional racism, it’s not about our own experiences, it’s about the system. We can’t just think about the symptoms, but how we tackle how the world works so we all have equality.

“We are coming to a crux point in human history and it’s Black people that have to lead.”