Hellaby’s thinks again about plant at Tuakau

Press, 17 April 1982, Page 11

Hellaby’s thinks again about plant at Tuakau

PA Auckland R. and W. Hellaby? Ltd, which has given notice of the partial closing of its Shortland plant at Otahuhu, is also having second thoughts about its proposal to build a new freezing works at Tuakau.

Five hundred workers will be dismissed by Hellaby at the end of August when it closes the mutton chains of its long-established Otahuhu plant.

The main reason for the demise of the plant was said to have been the rapid swing of South Auckland farmland to horticulture.

After having a plan for a new,' freezing works at Pukekohe rejected last year, the company turned its attention to Tuakau. 56km south of Auckland, and made a preliminary application for water rights.

Approval of the '.' water rights was granted fedently, '" but -Hellaby’s corporate adviser; Mr Owen Cook, said that-the. speed of the change to horticulture in South Auckland was causing the company •to look “very closely" at the Tuakau plan. “We have not given the plans away,” he said. “And we certainly intend to move towards building. elsewhere, but the question is whether South' Auckland is the place.” The company’s priority, he said, would be to seek an increase in the capacity of its plant at Taumarunui.

The secretary of the Auckland Freezing Workers’ Union,’ Mr T. P. Kelly, said he would not be surprised if the Tuakau proposal did not go ahead. He said the company was now facing a payout of “upwards of $4 million,” to workers who would be affected by the Shortland closing.

Commenting on the closing, Labour's Shadow Minister of Employment, Mr T. K. Burke, said that the Government had enacted a “law of the jungle” which allowed for the unco-ordinated and disorderly development of the meat industry. Decisions were being made without regard to the social consequences. . ,

"The bill for this is mainly left for the taxpayer to. pick up,” he said. The Hellaby settlement had 'been handled- by the company in a sensible manner but Labour was still concerned that some hundreds of workers were to be put out of work in an area of high unemployment. ■ The Government had abandoned any. role in the development’ of the industry when it delicensed it. The Government also should have wide-ranging employment protection and redundancy legislation so that ■ good settlements were not' just accidental or dependent upon enlightened

management and trade unions.

Mr Brian " Chamberlain, junior vice-president of Federated Farmers, said that the closing of the mutton and lamb killing chains, at the Shortland works was,a sign of the times. “From an economic point of view the meat industry has to tighten up.. At the same time it is hard on the people who have worked in the industry and serviced the farmers so well,” he said. "It is not a good thing. But with the rate of inflation we are having in New Zealand, farmers and freezing companies are having to reexamine their operations and trim their costs to be more economic.” Farmers had no trouble getting their stock killed this year, and although it was still too early to tell, things could tighten up next year if Hellaby’s did not build a new works, he said. The two Shortland chains — a third has not been used for several seasons — will •shut at the end of the bobby calf kill in late August. This will leave only a full beefkilling chain and a number of other associated departments. ‘

Mr Chamberlain said there was no doubt that in an 80km radius north and south of Auckland the sheep numbers and the amount of fattening stock from outside areas had

dropped. The main reasons were that farms in the back country had improved and farmers were now sending their lambs straight to the freezing works instead of sending them to other farms for fattening.

LoCal farmers were also retaining more stock for breeding and this had also reduced the numbers going to the works.

In the last 10 years urban sprawl and a change in land use as more people moved to deer and goat farming, and horticulture, had" also reduced the amount of sheep farming.