D.B. back on tap

Press, 1 March 1984, Page 2

D.B. back on tap

Most striking workers were due to return to work at midnight last night at the D.B. South Island brewery at Washdyke, near Timaru. Four inembers of the Allied Liquor Trades Union, however, will continue their strike as they refuse to work alongside two men who resigned from the union last week. The six men are employed by the Associated Bottlers Company but work at the D.B. plant. On Monday, 60 workers at the brewery and 20 from A.B.C. voted to strike after the two men resigned from the union. The South Island secretary of the Allied Liquor Trades Union, Mr Max Fletcher, said that the two non-union men work in the box-assembly area and the strike had now been isolated to this section.

Boxes produced from this section will not be handled by other union members. “Before the black ban on

this section becomes a real problem for the company it could be four weeks,” Mr Fletcher said. The four workers on strike were getting financial relief but not from union funds, he said. The manager of the D.B; South Island plant, Mr Barry Walker, said that the company was very happy that all the industrial action which caused the brewery production to stop had finished. He said that the brewery production was to restart at midnight last night. However, the Timaru manager of A.8.C., Mr Murray Tomkinson, said that the continuing action at the box-making plant was disappointing. “I certainly hope that the union and the two box factory workers who have opted out of the union can resolve their, differences so that the strike action can cease and the dispute be resolved,” he said.