'Hire and fire' disposable labour force is Gatwick's shame,
says Unite
30 November 2009
A disposable labour force of workers employed without guaranteed
hours or a minimum income is springing up at Gatwick, the UK's
second largest airport, to replace permanent workers being made
redundant, Unite the union has today (Monday) warned.
The union says that airport service company, Swissport, which
provides baggage handling and check-in services at Gatwick, has
dismissed paid permanent employees and is replacing them with a
casual workforce on zero hours contracts. The new workers are
forced to work daily shifts which have been as long as 17 hours,
starting at 6am and going on until 11pm.
The zero hours contracts also mean that Swissport does not have
to guarantee workers a minimum amount of hours work each week. The
workers live in constant fear of not getting enough work from day
to day, and from week to week do not know what they will be
earning. It also means they will struggle to get paid holidays, and
have no clear rights to sick leave or other benefits enjoyed by
permanent employees.
Unite says the casualisation of Swissport's Gatwick operation
began earlier this month as the company prepared to make 55
permanent baggage handlers redundant. The 55 baggage handlers were
offered redeployment but only on part-time contracts as Swissport
claimed that it only needed the workers during the early morning or
evening hours. However, the casual workers are being employed for
up to 17 hours a day. Swissport has repeatedly rejected all Unite's
request for talks at the conciliation service ACAS, instead
choosing to force through changes without agreement.
Madeleine Richards, Unite regional officer, said: “Swissport's
ditching of full time permanent employees for a hire and fire
workforce at Gatwick is a scandal. Gatwick is meant to be one of
the UK's major airports but its dirty secret is that a growing
number of the hard working men and women who help passengers make
their journeys do not know what they are earning from one week to
the next and can be sacked at a moment's notice. Most reputable
employers stopped using zero-hours contracts in the 1990s following
widespread condemnation of the practice.
“This is one of the worst examples I have come across of a
company using the recession to exploit and spread fear among its
workforce. It is also simply not acceptable that workers can be
expected to work 17 hour shifts daily, which they do because they
do not know where the next shift will come from. This cannot be
good for the workers' health and wellbeing, and nor can it support
a safe environment for the flying public.
“Unite is calling on Swissport to abandon this creeping
casualisation, stop the zero-hours contracts and reinstate the
permanent employees it recently dismissed. We repeat our offer to
talk through ACAS and are available to discuss these serious
matters with the company at any time.”
Unite believes that around 20 workers are now employed by
Swissport on a zero-hours basis, working up to 17 hour shifts with
no fixed working week. Swissport, which employs 750 workers in
baggage handling, check-in and aircraft despatch at Gatwick,
announced 81 redundancies in September.
Unite is concerned that Swissport introduced new staff on
"zero-hours contracts" to take over the work undertaken by those
recently dismissed. The new workers started at the beginning of
November, during the official consultation period on the
redundancies.
ENDS
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