On Monday 9th May, a small group of Nottingham visited the offices of Office Angels and ATOS Healthcare. Organised by the local Anarchist Federation and supported by various individuals, the protests were both part of coordinated national actions.

Office Angels

Office Angels is a national recruitment agency. In March, the Solidarity Federation began supporting a former Office Angels temporary worker. Dan had worked for the company for three days in December last year. Despite being assured that the lack of a timesheet would "not be a problem," Office Angels have refused to pay him wages he is owed, claiming he only worked for one day, even though they called him at work on his third day.

The Solidarity Federation has held a number of pickets across London and the country, demanding that Dan be paid. As part of an escalation of this campaign, the called a national week of action against the company from 9th-15th May. They suggested that people picket branches, "make solidarity calls and emails to the branch he had been working for on Wednesday 11 May" and, as Office Angels is a subsidiary of Adecco, that their branches be picketed also.

Office Angels' Nottingham office (dubbed "Angel House") is located on Cheapside, essentially in the side of the Council House/The Exchange, on the side the tram runs. A small group of activists picketed it from 11am until just before 12 noon. We gave out a number of leaflets (attached below) to passers-by, but only one person came out of the office in the time we were there and nobody went in. A couple of pickets went in to try and speak with the staff who were completely disinterested.

A couple of coppers arrived to keep an eye on us, but didn't interfere. They stood in the sheltered walkway opposite the office, in front of Squares. Surprisingly they weren't wearing the usual yellow jackets, perhaps suggesting they didn't think we'd be moving on. When we left they didn't make any effort to follow us.

ATOS Healthcare

ATOS Healthcare, our second target, is a subsidiary of ATOS Origin who have just begun a £300 million contract for the government to carry out "work capability assessments" on everybody claiming Incapacity Benefit. While it is claimed that these assessments are intended to test what people can do rather than what they cannot, the real purpose is to take benefits from as many people as possible. Already, people with terminal illnesses and severe medical conditions have been declared fit for work and had their benefits cuts. Plans announced for scrapping the Disability Living Allowance, suggest that this testing is likely to be extended to anybody claiming some form of disability or health related benefit.

ATOS has previously been targetted as part of national days of action in defence of benefits on 24th January and 14th April. A full week of action was called by various organisations for 9th-15th May. In response, we picketed ATOS Healthcare's offices, located in  "Price House", on Stoney Street in the Lace Market. Unfortunately, this is a fairly out of the way location, with few passers-by. It didn't help that we had apparently arrived during lunchtime, so there was nobody going into the office. Again, a couple of people went in to talk to staff, this time, finding only one person holding the fort.

It is clear that ATOS is a particularly deserving target. During our protests, one person came to talk to us about how they had been "screwed over" by the company who had fiddled the figures on their assessment to deny them benefits. They had won on appeal (as do 40% of appeals against the company's decisions), but were understandably angry. Another who supported people on benefits, expressed their gratitude that somebody was targeting the company, suggesting it was something they'd considered doing themselves.