Workers shocked by closing

Press, 28 April 1989, Page 2

Workers shocked by closing

PA Nelson Angry Odenberg Industries clothing workers were shocked yesterday to find their Tahuna factory stripped and their jobs gone. Weeping workers had had no warning that the Bolt Road factory .would close yesterday. R. W. Saunders, Ltd, the company for whom they were working on contract, had removed its orders overnight, abruptly ending its contract and making 35 Nelson women unemployed. Odenberg Industries had been in receivership since December 9, but its receivers had been able to keep the plant going through contract work for the Auckland-based Saunders company. A receiver, Mrs Sandra Goodchild, said yesterday she had been advised the contract work was no longer required. But staff are appalled at the suddenness of the decision.

“What’s upset people is the lack of notice. It perhaps could have been accepted more if they had come in and told us what they were doing. We certainly would have expected to finish the work. Mrs Goodchild said the receivers would have discussions with other employers in the Nelson district to see if alternative employment could be found for the Odenberg staff. The firm’s executive chairman, Mr Owen Tallentire, said the company, the parent company of Odenberg Industries, had advised the receivers last Thursday that its present order would be the last at Tahuna. Mr Tailentire said the dresses had been removed on Wednesday night, some still unfinished, because the clothing workers’ union had placed an embargo on goods when Saunders closed its Christchurch factory two years ago.