Petone meat plant closes: 800 jobless

Press, 17 November 1981, Page 1

Petone meat plant closes: 800 jobless

PA Wellington Petone’s Gear Meat processing plant finally closed yesterday, leaving about 800 people jobless as a “shocked” union chief and the management blamed each other for the shutdown. The company said the Meat Workers’ Union’s Petone branch was to blame for the closing, because it would not allow staff numbers to be reduced through natural attrition at the lossmaking works. But the Meat Workers’ Union’s national secretary (Mr A. J. Kennedy) said the shutdown, which will cut Some $l5 million a year from Wellington’s economy, was the management’s fault and the company was putting up a smokescreen by blaming the union. ■ .The chairman of Gear Meat Processing, Ltd (Mr Michael Groomej, announcing' the shutdown yesterday morning, said that the direc-

tors had decided there was no choice but to close the works because of the union's demand for parity with North Island west coast meat workers. Mr Groome said he could not guarantee redundancy money for anyone not now employed at the plant, which had been due to open for the killing season next week. “Because of the serious financial losses we experienced last year and. the unrealistic attitude of the union, we will find it difficult to accept any requests to pay redundancy, money to workers not currently employed here,” he said. The 205 salaried workers, clerical staff, maintenance staff, and union members now working at the plant were told of the shutdown decision yesterday. With seasonal workers a total of about 800 people will be affected. . In a booklet last June the

company said it wanted to keep the Petone plant open and redevelop the works, but this depended on industrial . agreements which would have allowed it to become profitable again after losses every year since 1974, totalling about $8.95 million. In the 12 months to July 31 this year the company lost $4.9 million; Mr Groome said,' “It is apparent that the union hierarchy will not accept pay fates or disputes procedures necessary to ensure the viability of the plant.” Mr Kennedy commented that- it was significant the closing should come .such a short time before a General Election. The union had already conceded pay reductions and reductions in manning levels, said Mr Kennedy. “But is is natural for the employers to put up some sort of smokescreen to justify what they are doing.”

Workers at the plant said yesterday morning they could not talk about, the closing because they had not been told themselves. A meeting between salaried staff and management was held about 10 a.m. but it was not until about 10.30 a.m. that the official notification was delivered to the union office. Some workers spoken to at the plant appeared stunned and were extremely critical of the lack of notification from the company. “This was .the first we have heard of it,” said one. . “Why were the news media told before the workers?” asked another. Some Gear staff echoed the opinion of their employers that Meat Workers’ Union intransigence had forced the closing of their Petone employment. “I don’t blame the management, I blame the union — the leaders, riot the

workers,'.’ said one woman, who declined to be named. . The president of the staff salaried foremen’s guild, Mr Russell Jackson, who has worked at Gear for 35 years, said the closing had come as a big blow to his 29 members and the people of Petone. “My members were bitter and upset after hearing the announcement this morning.” Many felt the activities of “other employee organisations” were to blame, Mr Jackson said. He would not elaborate. Maintenance tradesmen, paid off and packing up by midday, said their feelings were unprintable. Of the 66 meat workers employed before the start of the season only 17 will stay for a short time — six in the freezing chambers, two in the kelly gang, one in the rendering department, and eight watchmen. The others received a week’s pay in lieu of'notice

and were told they' would also receive redundancy payments along "Government guidelines.” The closing of the works had been called “a very sad state of affairs.” by the leader of the Labour Party (Mr Rowling).’ It. had many of the same hallmarks as the closing of the Southdown works in Auckland, he said. Referring to remarks by the Prime Minister (Mr Muldoon) in Masterton on Friday when he said the Petone workers had priced themselves out of tire market. Mr Rowling said: “Mr Muldoon obviously knew that something was happening." Predicting that Mr Muldoon could try to turn it into an election issue Mr Rowling said: ... “Anything that can cloud the real issues would be welcomed-by the Government. “We can’t just go on dumping people on the scrapheap

and adding to the problems we have already got in that respect.” It was obvious the Gear works was badly sited, but closer examination should be made of adapting to a processing and . packaging scheme, he said. The Minister of Labour (Mr Bolger) • said yesterday the close-down was not unexpected. Union leadership would have a lot to answer for. "Unfortunately it’s not,all that unexpected given the attitude the trade union leaders have adopted at that plant.” Mr Bolger said it would be wrong to see a pattern from the closing of the Gear meat works and’ the Southdown works near Auckland earlier this year. "There is certainly a broad acceptance from, within the

industry that Gear was located in the wrong place long-term and so was the freezing works at Southdown. "What will assist these older works to maintain a competitive position and remain viable is a responsible attitude by the unions. I think it may be necessary for the workers in New Zealand to take a leaf out of what the . workers did at Leyland in the United Kingdom and that was to ignore the union leaders and accept the realistic offers of the employers,” Mr Bolger said. The executive director of the Employers Federation (Mr J. W. Rowe) said the closing was highly regrettable. "However, the works lost $4 million last year and clearly, that could not continue.” he said.

“Had the unions co-oper-ated with the employer, the outcome might have been different, because the closing of the works is at least partly due to the inflexible attitudes of the union officials involved. “The lesson on all of this is that union officials and workers ignore economic reality at their peril. This is the case whether it is at the individual plant level, as with Gear Meats, or at the national level where excessive wage demands and inflexible work patterns simply increase unemployment,” Mr Rowe said. The Freezing Companies Association’s executive director (Mr Peter Blomfield) said the Hawke’s Bay Farmers’ Meat Company which brought Gear last year had tried very hard to reach an agreement with the union to ensure that the plant stayed open. Mr Blomfield said the company was prepared to spend several million dollars on upgrading Gear provided there was a reduction in labour costs.

“I cannot understand why the union would not want to co-operate in achieving that objective so that their members could be kept in employment,” Mr Blomfield said.

Farmer leaders say they are surprised and. disappointed by the closing. The chairman of the meat and wool section of Wairarapa Federated Farmers (Mr Rick Vallance) said farmers in the Wellington region would face extra transport costs to take their stock to other works. Mr Vallance warned that the remaining freezing companies in the area could have trouble coping with the numbers of lambs, particularly if there was a drought this summer.

“The overseas price for lamb, as high as fresh English lamb, can go no higher. The farmers cannot survive on any smaller share of the overseas price and in fact the Government is having to use taxpayers' money to pay for the increased killing charges through the Supplementary Minimum Prices scheme.” The director of the Ministry of Agriculture’s Meat Division, Mr John McNab, said that the Gear works was one of three which the European Commission said were unlikely to be approved for supplying the Common Market. They had said that big capital works were needed if the plant was to gain approval.

The cost of this upgrading had been estimated by the company in June to be about $8 million.