[analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/GettyImages-2170792148.jpg?w=1024″]<\/p>\n
\n\tMore than 300 workers across London\u2019s Victoria and Albert Museum are voting on whether to strike over salary, working conditions, and what unions describe as unsafe heatwave policies.<\/p>\n
\n\tAccording to the\u00a0Guardian,\u00a0<\/em>the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union launched the ballot on July 23, covering employees at the V&A\u2019s flagship South Kensington museum, Young V&A in Bethnal Green, and the V&A East Museum and Storehouse in Stratford. The union said soaring temperatures, limited access to drinking water during shifts, and pay disputes have pushed staff to consider the strike.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe union\u2019s demands include a minimum 4 percent pay increase, a policy requiring public areas to close when indoor temperatures are greater than 86 degrees, additional protection for behind-the-scenes staff working in the heat, and permission for employees at V&A East Storehouse to carry water while working around objects on display. (As of now, the staff must be relieved by another worker before leaving to get a drink, according to the union.)<\/p>\n \n\tPCS is also urging the museum to become an accredited\u00a0London Living Wage\u00a0employer. While the V&A says all directly employed staff already earn at least the London Living Wage, it acknowledged some outsourced contractors do not, and said accreditation will be reviewed later this year.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe strike ballot comes during one of Britain\u2019s hottest summers on record and is thought to be among the first centered specifically on workplace conditions during a heatwave.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\t\u201cThe V&A has been in negotiations with the trade union side since February and those negotiations are ongoing,\u201d a museum spokesperson told the\u00a0Guardia<\/em>, adding that its latest proposal includes a 3.6% increase to the overall pay bill, above-inflation pay awards, and a 6.9% raise for its lowest-paid employees. The museum also said it introduced additional rest breaks, increased staff rotations, closed several galleries at South Kensington, and shut Young V&A for 11 days during the peak of the heatwave.\u00a0<\/p>\n \n\tThe Prospect union is separately balloting its own V&A members over pay and working conditions, with that vote set to close on July 29.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n [analyse_source url=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/art-news\/news\/va-workers-strike-ballot-pay-heatwave-conditions-1234793516\/”]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" [analyse_image type=”featured” src=”https:\/\/www.artnews.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2025\/01\/GettyImages-2170792148.jpg?w=1024″] More than 300 workers across London\u2019s Victoria and Albert Museum are voting on whether to strike over salary, working conditions, and what unions describe as unsafe heatwave policies. According to the\u00a0Guardian,\u00a0the Public and Commercial Services (PCS) union launched the ballot on July 23, covering employees at the V&A\u2019s flagship South Kensington museum, […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[61,226],"class_list":["post-2064290","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-politics","tag-artnews-com","tag-crawlmanager"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2064290","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2064290"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2064290\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2064290"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2064290"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/analyse.optim.biz\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2064290"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}