Ballot begins as angry Diageo workers hit back against slurs
19th October 2009
Angry workers at Diageo sites in Kilmarnock, Port Dundas and
Shieldhall moved closer to industrial action to defend their jobs
and plants as a consultative ballot opens tomorrow (Tuesday).
The ballot begins at the Diageo plants facing heaviest job
losses with the workforce furious at insinuations made recently
that greed is what is motivating the workers' vigorous fight to
save jobs.
Last year, Diageo made over £2 billion in profits - up 10 per
cent on the previous year - and awarded its CEO Paul Walsh a pay
packet of £3.5 million. Walsh, who has shares in the company
worth more than £6 million, will also benefit from the fact that
shareholder dividends are up by 5 per cent. Earlier this
year, the workers accepted pay freezes and agreed to other cost
saving measures, having been promised this would protect jobs for
the future.
Yet the company is now threatening to punish workers refusing to
accept its savage restructuring plans, which would see 900 workers
thrown on the dole, close the historic home of Johnnie Walker in
Kilmarnock and shut the Port Dundas distillery in Glasgow, by
scything redundancy pay down to the state minimum. This would
see workers, many of whom have given decades of loyal service to
the company, lose out on thousands of pounds in their time of
greatest need.
Jennie Formby, Unite national officer for the drink sector,
attacked Diageo's threats: "Here we have a mega-profitable, global
giant trying to use its might and muscle to frighten Scottish
workers into meek acceptance of savage cuts and plans which would
ruin their communities.
"Diageo is showing its true colours now. Threatening to
impose poverty at a time when people are frightened about their
jobs and futures is deeply cynical, and coming from a company which
has billions of pounds worth of pure profit sitting in the bank,
nothing short of heartless.
"And we will absolutely not stand by while nasty insinuations
are made in the press that workers are being greedy in seeking a
fair redundancy deal from a company that makes millionaires out of
senior executives yet threatens to slash redundancy packages when
their workers ask for a fair deal.
"Our members are determined to fight to save their jobs and are
not prepared to be thrown on the dole simply to further boost
Diageo's already huge profits. They will show the strength of
their anger when they vote on industrial action but we urge the
company to avoid needless conflict by reopening dialogue with the
workers and their unions on a fairer way forward on
restructuring."
Unite recently proposed a plan which could save Diageo over £80
million and avoid the £36 million cost of shutting the Kilmarnock
plant, the last major private sector employer in that
community.
The union is also pressing for fair packages for those workers
who opt for voluntary redundancies. It wants the company to give
packages of at least equal value to previous closures, and to
reverse the decision, imposed just three months before Diageo
announced its closure plans, for the ability for people to commute
a portion of their redundancy pay into their pension to allow early
retirement.
The consultative ballot of the workers at the Kilmarnock, Port
Dundas and Shieldhall plants opens on Tuesday, October 20th, and
will close on Friday, October 30th.
ENDS
For further information, please contact Pauline Doyle on 07976
832 861.
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