Equity ballots members in WNO chorus

Equity, the trade union for the performing arts and entertainment industries in the United Kingdom, has begun to ballot its members in the chorus of Welsh National Opera for industrial action in a dispute over proposals to cut their pay and to reduce the size of the chorus.

The ballot for industrial action is a response to dispute over WNO’s proposals to cut its chorus’ pay by at least 15% and ‘reduce and rebalance the size of the chorus’. In a process which Equity claims ‘will lead to a real threat of compulsory redundancy’. The union delivered the notification of intent to ballot to WNO Management last week. The ballot commences this week and will run until 4 September.

Simon Curtis, Equity’s national and regional official for Wales and South West England says: ‘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.’

According to Equity research, almost 80% of its members in the WNO chorus said the proposals would have a ‘high or significant impact on their personal finances’, with 78% of them saying they may have to leave WNO and over half (56%) saying they would have to leave the industry altogether.

The proposals come as the WNO faces difficult financial challenges as a result of a 35 per cent funding cut from Arts Council England (ACE) in November 2022 and a further 11.8 per cent cut from Arts Council Wales (ACW) in late 2023 as well as a reduction in performance and ticket revenue, reduced Theatre Tax Relief income, inflation and the cost-of-living crisis. In July, Musicians’ Union members in the WNO’s orchestra voted ‘overwhelmingly in favour’ of potential strike action in response to the company’s proposal to make the orchestra part-time and cut musicians’ pay by 15 per cent, as well as cutting down on touring.

In a statement released today, Equity called for WNO to ‘go back to the drawing board on these unjust proposals’ and stated: ‘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.’