ACTU – All workers should be very afraid if sneaky Parmalat can tear up EBA

The Australian Council of Trade Unions (ACTU) has today condemned the actions of dairy manufacturer Parmalat, which is attempting to tear up its current enterprise agreement with employees, and has locked workers out of their factory indefinitely, because they refused to agree to a new deal that would have seen their wages and entitlements cut.

Parmalat has locked out 60 workers from its Echuca plant, after the employees refused to sign a new agreement that would see their wage rates halved and redundancy payments heavily reduced.

The ACTU said Parmalat’s treatment of its 60 employees is appalling and represents a disturbing trend of large corporate organisations trying to intimidate workers into accepting bad pay deals.

Quotes attributable to ACTU President Ged Kearney:

• “The cancellation of enterprise agreements: locking workers out and then tearing up agreements: and/or using loopholes in the Fair Work Act to sack workers and then rehire them on lower wages and conditions is a devious trend large Australian corporate organisations are now using to intimidate workers into accepting bad pay deals.”
• "We’ve seen it happen at CUB, Griffin Mining, AGL and now at Parmalat.”
• “We will fight back against agreement-busting tactics that attack workers’ rights, an attack that will ultimately affect all workers if companies can simply tear up enterprise agreements with no consequences.“
• “These workers — some of whom have been with the company for over 35 years — are entitled to their existing wages and conditions, they are entitled to some respect and dignity after years of loyalty to the company. Cutting their wages shows no respect, offers no dignity and is nothing less than an exhibition of pure greed on the employers’ part.”