Google has reached an agreement with the Prospect trade union to allow it to organise and communicate with around 7,000 employees across its UK operations, marking a significant development in efforts to expand trade union representation in the country’s technology sector. The agreement, announced on Monday, November 2, will cover employees working across Google’s UK operations, including YouTube, but will exclude its artificial intelligence subsidiary, Google DeepMind.
Under the arrangement, Prospect will be permitted to organise meetings and membership sessions within Google’s offices, including its prominent headquarters in King’s Cross, London. The union will also be able to establish direct contact with employees who are not currently members and encourage them to join. The move is expected to provide trade union representatives with greater opportunities to engage with technology sector workers and build membership within one of the world’s largest technology companies.
Prospect, which represents more than 160,000 workers across different sectors in the UK, has been working to expand its presence in the technology industry. Its general secretary, Mike Clancy, described the agreement as an important indication that even major multinational technology companies could establish formal arrangements with trade unions.
Clancy said employees in the technology industry deserved a stronger voice in decisions affecting their professional lives. He highlighted issues such as salaries, workplace flexibility, the growing use of artificial intelligence and organisational culture as areas where workers should have greater representation. He also expressed hope that Google’s decision would encourage other technology companies to develop similar working relationships with trade unions.
Google, meanwhile, said the agreement had been signed to comply with the UK’s recently introduced workplace legislation. A company spokesperson said the arrangement builds on its existing engagement with internal employee representative groups and is intended to meet the new legal requirements while maintaining direct communication between the company and its workforce.
The agreement comes amid significant changes to employment regulations in the UK, with the Employment Rights Act introducing new provisions aimed at strengthening trade union access to workplaces. The legislation gives recognised trade unions the right to enter workplaces to meet employees and communicate with workers electronically, including those who are not already union members. From January, employers will also be required to inform their employees about their right to join a trade union.
The new provisions are expected to make it easier for unions to approach workers and recruit members, particularly in large private-sector organisations where establishing a union presence has traditionally been challenging. Earlier, trade unions often had to approach employees outside their workplaces to build support and encourage membership.
Google’s agreement follows a similar arrangement between Prospect and Meta, the parent company of Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, which employs approximately 5,000 people in the UK. The agreement with Meta has also allowed the union to communicate with employees and expand its membership within the company.
However, Google DeepMind will remain outside the latest agreement. The Communication Workers Union (CWU) and Unite are pursuing separate efforts to secure union recognition at the artificial intelligence division. Discussions around union representation at DeepMind are expected to proceed independently of the arrangement covering Google’s other UK operations.
Paul Nowak, general secretary of the Trades Union Congress (TUC), has also indicated that the new workplace access provisions could lead to a wider expansion of trade union recognition agreements across the private sector over the coming year.
The agreement with Google is being viewed as an important development in the changing relationship between technology companies and organised labour in the UK, particularly as employees seek greater participation in decisions concerning pay, working conditions and the increasing integration of artificial intelligence into the workplace.
