Equity Ballots Members in Welsh National Opera Chorus on Strike Action

Members of the chorus of the Welsh National Opera (WNO) are being balloted for industrial action in a dispute over proposals to cut their pay by at least 15% and to reduce and rebalance the size of the chorus, already under resourced, with a process which will lead to a real threat of compulsory redundancy.

Equity delivered the notification of intent to ballot to WNO Management last week. The ballot commences this week, with members receiving their ballots through the post from today, and will run until the 4th September.

WNO management continue to cite ongoing financial difficulties caused by substantial cuts to their funding from both Arts Council England (ACE) and Arts Council of Wales (ACW). However, Equity and its members have been clear from the start. We will not accept compulsory redundancies or the desire of WNO management to make contracts ‘flexible’ solely to their own advantage, while adding the precarity of an unsustainable cut to chorus members’ basic earnings. Our resistance to the current proposals cannot, and will not, be contingent on the decisions of funders.

WNO must go back to the drawing board on these unjust proposals and engage on a process which protects the full-time status of our members and recognises the huge value this highly skilled workforce bring to the reputation of the company and to its work.  

Simon Curtis, Equity’s National and Regional Official for Wales and South West England said, “WNO management seem intent on pushing through these changes at speed under the misguided impression that this will, in some way, allow our members the opportunity to maximise the possibility of other employment. These proposals, however, are unsustainable for our members and potentially catastrophic for the sector more widely in the UK. Almost 80% of them said it would have a high or significant impact on their personal finances, with 78% of them saying they may have to leave WNO. Such is the precarity of their situation, over half (56%) say they would have to leave the industry altogether, while a further third (32%) say that they may have to. As their union we will keep all options open to fight an attack on our members livelihoods.”