Dinner ladies get set for all-out stoppage

Derbyshire's dinner ladies are preparing for an all-out strike after two one-day stoppages failed to resolve the dispute over cuts in spending and hours.

At a meeting in Chesterfield on Monday during the second one-day protest, dinner ladies called for a complete strike. Workers in Matlock delivered the same message, said the Unison trade union.

A further ballot may have to be held for an all-out strike, but another one-day stoppage is planned for next Monday.

The council admitted that more dinner ladies joined the strike last Monday than in the previous week. It said 836 of the 1,400 workers did not come to work, against 810 before.

Dave Wilcox, chair of the council's education committee said: "Every time we have a strike, it's damaging to the school meals service. Children bring in sandwiches and it can be difficult to win them back."

Unison branch secretary John Owen accused the council of wanting to wreck the service. "If these cuts go ahead, we aren't going to have a school meals service in Derbyshire," he said.

The strikes were called overplans to slash the £2.6m annual budget for meals by cutting dinner ladies' hours by 10%.