Unite tells BMW heads, you have treated your workforce with
contempt - but there will be no further sackings next week
19th February 2009
Tony Woodley, joint general secretary of the UK's biggest union,
Unite, has today (Thursday) written to the chairman of BMW's board
of management to protest in the strongest possible terms the
union's "outrage" at the manner in which 330 BMW agency workers
were summarily sacked earlier this week - and warned the German car
company that there will be no further repeats of last Monday's
disgraceful sackings.
BMW is seeking to sack a total of 850 agency workers in total at
its Cowley plant, 330 of whom were dismissed one hour before their
shift finished on Monday of this week. The balance, 520
workers, face the sack when they return to work this coming
Monday.
However, Tony Woodley has warned BMW that Unite will not accept any
further dismissals. Instead, Mr Woodley says that the company
must sit down with the union as a matter of urgency to discuss
saving jobs at the plant. Unite is also accusing BMW of
abusing the agreement on agency labour at Cowley, taking advantage
of the workers' lack of rights to exploit working men and women,
throwing them to the dole without further expense to or effort by
the company.
In his letter to Dr Norber Reithofer, chairman of the BMW
management board, Tony Woodley says: "You have treated your
workforce with utter contempt. The difficulties of the car industry
globally are well known, but the manner in which BMW has sought to
address the reduction of its volumes at the Cowley plant in the UK
is nothing short of disgraceful. You would not treat a dog
this way, never mind loyal and committed employees.
"The dismissal of the weekend shift, with many workers who have
worked at Cowley for up to five years, with only one hour's notice,
has to rank as the most outrageous form of dismissal that we have
experienced in the car industry in the UK.
"You have exploited not only our agreement on the use of agency
labour, but also more importantly, you have exploited ordinary men
and women who deserve better treatment from an employer of your
standing."
Tony Woodley goes on to say that Unite will not accept the
dismissal of a further 520 agency workers when they return to work
as expected on Monday, 23rd February. Many of these workers
remain unclear as to whether or not they even have a job to go to
on Monday as they have received no word from the company concerning
its plans for them:
"Notwithstanding any announcements you may already have made to
employees, permanent or agency, we do not expect you to confirm any
dismissals until we have had proper negotiations about the
situation." continued Tony Woodley.
Tony Woodley states that the agreement to allow the use of agency
labour at the plant was "most certainly not to see the creation of
second class citizens who do not have the entitlement to redundancy
payments in spite of years of service.
"My members, be they permanent or agency, are workers with families
and responsibilities, not some asset to be cast aside as cannon
fodder."
Asserting that the company has been "secretive" with its plans to
dismiss the workers, Tony Woodley is urging BMW to now change tack
and instead work with Unite on ways to address the downturn and
retain skilled workers:
"I not only speak for my members but I think for Britain, when I
ask for a meeting with your company to find a more acceptable
solution to what I appreciate is a difficult time for BMW and the
industry."
ENDS
For further information, contact Pauline Doyle on 07976 832 861
Reead the full text of Tony
Woodley's letter to the BMW management board.
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