Who’s on strike today and how will it affect you? Daily update for February 27

Energy workers, DVLA and Land Registry staff and DWP employees will walk out today as strikes rage on across the UK.

Workers at the UK’s largest power station – Drax in North Yorkshire – are striking over pay in a move that ‘threatens power cuts’.

More than 180 staff members, who are members of Unite, have rejected an 8% increase.

It’s been described ‘a substantial real terms pay cut’ when compared with the inflation rate.

When Drax is fully operational it generates 7% of the UK’s electricity.

The company is estimated to generate profits in excess of £680 million for 2022, an increase of well over 50% on the previous year, Unite says.

But bosses say they’re ‘deeply disappointed’ after a ‘generous, full and final pay settlement’ was rejected.

Land Registry workers start five days of industrial action on Monday, joined by a new wave of Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency staff.

Cooling towers stand within the Drax Group Plc.'s power station complex near Selby, U.K., on Wednesday, May 4, 2016. Drax Group Plc, the utility converting the U.K.'s biggest coal station to a plant generating heat from compressed waste, says its commitment to curbing pollution could result in getting government support. Photographer: Simon Dawson/Bloomberg via Getty Images — Drax is the UK’s largest power station (Picture: Bloomberg via Getty Images)

More than 350 people will walk out over pay, pensions, redundancy terms and job security.

The action will take place in Birkenhead, Coventry, Croydon, Durham, Fylde, Gloucester, Hull, Leicester, Nottingham, Peterborough, Plymouth, Swansea, Telford and Weymouth.

PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka said: ‘As long as the government shows no sign of resolving this dispute, we’ll show no signs to stopping strike action.

‘Ministers seem able to find money for just about everything other than giving their own employees a decent pay rise. PCS members have had enough of being taken for granted.’

The government has insisted there is no more money in the pot for pay rises amid the cost of living crisis.

Meanwhile, Department for Work and Pensions staff in Liverpool are walking out as part of a national campaign over pay, pensions, job security and redundancy terms.

SWANSEA, WALES - FEBRUARY 13: A woman holds a sign as DVLA (Driver and Vehicle Licensing Agency) workers and representatives from the PCS (Public and Commercial Services) Union gather during a strike outside the DVLA in Morriston on February 13, 2023, in Swansea, Wales. The strike, which will last five days, forms part of national industrial action by the??PCS union over pay, pensions, jobs and redundancy terms. (Photo by Matthew Horwood/Getty Images) — A woman holds a sign as DVLA workers strike (Picture: Getty Images)

Those at Toxteth Jobcentre, Liverpool Duke Street Jobcentre, Liverpool City Jobcentre, Liverpool Innovation Park Jobcentre will strike.

The PCS union has cautioned that its lowest-paid members earn just £21,000 a year.

But the DWP insists the PCS union’s demands ‘would cost the country an unaffordable £2.4 billion at a time when our focus must be on bringing down inflation to ease the pressure on households across the country’.

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First appear at Who’s on strike today and how will it affect you? Daily update for February 27