Toyota plant suspensions justified, says judge

Press, 1 July 1988, Page 3

Toyota plant suspensions justified, says judge

By

RICHARD CRESSWELL,

industrial reporter The suspensions of 63 production workers at the Toyota assembly plant in July last year were justified, Judge Palmer has ruled in the Labour Court. He rejected a claim by the Engineers’ Union, on behalf of the workers, for lost wages and allowances. Storeworkers at the assembly plant went on strike because of a claim for a “dirt allowance.” A full management team met to decide whether there was enough work for production workers.

The Judge said Mr Eddington, the personnel manager of Toyota, had concluded that within section 128 of the Industrial Relations Act there would no longer be normal work available. Other options were considered but it was decided to suspend the production workers and inform the Engineers’ Union. The main issue was whether normal work was available to the production workers during the strike.

The Judge concluded that Toyota, because of the strike, was unable to non-striking production workers with work.

Once the production line had ceased its normal operation the company had suspended the workers at certain work stations and then emptied the production line by suspending others at different times. The later production workers would have been employed on work not normally done by them. The company had suspended all production workers at the same time. The union had argued that a disputes procedure in the collective agreement between the company and workers had not been invoked. It also argued that the

dispute had arisen from Toyota’s failure reasonably to anticipate and prevent the strike by storeworkers through invoking a disputes hearing. The Judge said he could not characterise the “dirt alllowance” sought as a dispute of rights. It may have comprised a “dispute of interest” which fell outside the disputes procedure in the collective agreement, he said.

He could not conclude Toyota should have known the storeworkers would strike on July 6, or that Toyota was at fault in deferring, until a July 8 meeting, initiatives the company sought with storeworkers.