Union disputes need for suspensions

Press, 13 March 1987, Page 5

Union disputes need for suspensions

A claim that there was no work available to workers suspended for a week from a Feltex carpet factory was disputed in the Arbitration Court in Christchurch yesterday. The Court heard that a strike by maintenance workers at the factory in August and September, 1985, led to other workers being suspended as machinery broke down and less work was able to be done.

The Woollen Mills’ Union claimed that Feltex Woven Carpets, Ltd. had wrongfully suspended yam storemen, the afternoon shift of winders, and a part-time quality control ■worker. »

Mr Andrew Lea said the union was treating the matter as a "class” action for the storemen and winders by presenting the case of a representative of each. Mrs Christine Paulin, a quality control worker, presented documents to the Court which the union claimed showed other people had done the work normally done by her while she had been suspended.

She said she had been given a suspension notice while still performing her normal work. She was told that there was not enough for her and another technician and that she had to leave.

She said that the other technician completed the test she had been working on then continued to do her work while she was suspended. The other technician usually did other duties.

Mrs Isobel van Pelt, a charge hand and union delegate, said she and other winders were suspended although there was still some w'ork they could have done. Loom operators did the work while they were laid off.

Mr Keith Sutherland, who was then a storeman and union delegate, said the yam storemen were dismissed although there was still wool to be processed. The wool would

have gone to the winders before being handled by the storemen.

Messrs Ariva Ngaata and Peter Jamieson said they were dismissed when they were rostered to work a carding machine that had broken down. Mr Lea said the carders were rostered to work different machines each night. He submitted that the two men should have been suspended only for the nights they would have been rostered to work a broken machine. Other carders would then have had to be suspended when it was their turn to work a broken machine, thus spreading the impact of Suspension.

The system of rostering men to different machines had been done for more than 20 years before the strike and suspensions and was still being used by the factory.

The then works manager, Mr Michael Mooyman, told the Court that the decision to suspend Mrs Paulin came after her workload had dropped to 25 per cent of normal. There was not enough work for both technicians. The other technician was trained to perform all tests done by Mrs Paulin and was able to perform a test that Mrs Paulin could not.

The amount of work shown in the documents

presented by Mrs Paulin represented only two or three hours work, he said. Counsel for Feltex, Mr Neil McPhail, disputed the union’s ability to take a “class” action on behalf of the storemen and winders. Evidence had been presented by individuals only, and so there was no case to be answered.

The company’s evidence showed that there was no work available at the time the workers were suspended, therefore all the suspensions were justified.

The Court, comprising Chief Judge Horn and Messrs Ernie Ball and Wes Cameron, reserved decision.