Wikimedia Foundation staff employed in the United Kingdom have joined the United Tech & Allied Workers (UTAW-CWU) union and have made the first formal step of the union recognition process by requesting voluntary recognition from WMF. This would form the UK branch of the WWU (WWU-UK). A substantial majority of the WMF’s UK staff are already members of UTAW-CWU.

UTAW-CWU and WWU call on the Wikimedia Foundation, as the effective management of the global organisation, to act in good faith throughout the recognition process and to uphold the recent public support and commitments from its leadership affirming the rights of eligible staff to organise and form a union.

UTAW-CWU have published a CWU press release and a UTAW press release.

Enquiries to be directed to the CWU Press Officer, Marcus Barnett, at mbarnett@cwu.org.

We would like to express our deepest gratitude to all those who have chosen to sign WWU solidarity petitions on both Meta and on the English Wikipedia. These are community-initiated petitions, and the level of support shown gave us confidence to continue with our efforts to form a global solidarity union of WMF employees.

-- WWU-UK Branch June 24, 2026