Due to strike action, in a long-running dispute over privatisation, affecting the National Gallery, the museum is expecting some room closures on 20 May, and 26 May to 4 June, that will limit public access to the collection. It is expected that the featured exhibition Inventing Impressionism will not be affected and ticket holders should go to the gallery as planned. Bosses at the National Gallery in central London recently sacked leading PCS union activist Candy Udwin. He was suspended in January on the eve of the gallery workers’ first five day walkout against privatisation.
A leading left wing newspaper said, “Candy received formal notification of the bosses’ decision to sack her today, Friday. It follows a disciplinary hearing on Tuesday of this week. Some 50 gallery workers and their supporters held a protest in support of Candy outside the gallery that morning. PCS general secretary Mark Serwotka told the protest, “There can be no settlement to this strike without a just settlement for Candy, which means the charges are dropped and she is allowed back at work. “If Candy is sacked then we will take industrial action. And we will mean action, until she is allowed back at work.”
Workers at the National Gallery have already had 17 days of protest action since January. They are now set to hold a one-day walkout on Tuesday of next week. They’re also set to be a strike from 26 May to 4 June, and PCS has called a national protest in Trafalgar Square, central London, for 30 May.