Assembly plant to lay off 65

Press, 28 August 1982, Page 7

Assembly plant to lay off 65

PA Auckland The Motor Industries, Ltd, car-assembly plant at Otahuhu will lay off 65 workers, but. the Auckland Engineers’ Union says it will not accept the need for the redundancies. Announcing the development, the director of Motor Industries, Mr R. W. Elliott, said the company would on Tuesday negotiate a redundancy programme with unions for up to 65 workers. He said the talks would explore “ways and means” of reducing the impact. But an organiser for the Engineers’ Union, Mr R. ,C. Cowley, said he was “pretty sour” about the move. The union’s attitude would be that there should be no redundancies. “We will go into those talks looking for alternative

work for those people within that company,” he said. “In the 1970 s we built up a good rapport with them, but now they have gone cold just like the rest of the motorassembly industry.” Motor Industries is a contract assembler for Mazda Motors New Zealand, Ltd. Mr Elliott said the redundancies had been brought about by a request from Mazda to reduce.assembly volumes. Production of the Subaru at the company’s Waitara plant will not be affected. Assembly there will be kept at present levels. Of the 65 workers who are to be laid off, about six are members of the Northern Storepersons .and Packers’ Union. The rest are Engineers’ Union members.