31st Jan 2025 10:38
(Alliance News) - A leading union has made a formal complaint to an ethical trading alliance on behalf of its members who are on strike at a food manufacturer.
Hundreds of members of Unite at the Bakkavor Group PLC site in Spalding, Lincolnshire, have been taking industrial action since last September in a dispute over pay.
Unite said it has made a formal complaint to the Ethical Trading Initiative, ETI, claiming the company had refused to engage in meaningful negotiations and had brought in "strike breakers" from other sites.
Bakkavor denied the claims and said the industrial action had not disrupted its business.
Unite General Secretary Sharon Graham said: "Bakkavor's utter unwillingness to negotiate and to attempt to break a lawful strike has left Unite with no choice.
"Not only are we telling their customers about their unethical behaviour, but we will be targeting any company that continues to do business with them.
"Bakkavor need to understand that Unite is ramping up our campaign to win fair pay for our members."
Mike Edwards, chief executive of Bakkavor, said: "As highlighted in our trading update, Unite has failed to disrupt our business, despite their continued strike action in the face of a very strong and improved final offer that has been put on the table.
"As with their run of emotive and false claims – for example, disruption to Christmas food supply, 'years of real term pay cuts' and that 'the majority of the workforce only earn 10p above the National Living Wage' – their new tactic of claiming that we are breaching ethical trading regulations is also untrue.
"In September, Bakkavor put forward an improved offer of 7.8% to its lowest paid colleagues and 6.4% across all other grades.
"At our Spalding site over the same three-year period, the pay rate has risen by between 21.2% and 22.8% for colleagues – above inflation for the period.
"Furthermore, we think it useful to confirm as a matter of fact that the cost of labour at Spalding is the highest across all our UK sites – something that sits at the very heart of the problem with Unite's position on this matter.
"Given our significant efforts to engage in meaningful negotiations and the strong offer we put forward, Unite's ongoing calls for rejection made it obvious that the 2024 collective bargaining process was exhausted.
"Therefore, we lawfully proceeded to offer colleagues the proposed pay offer on an individual basis."
Bakkavor shares rose 1.7% to 134.74 pence each on Friday morning in London.
By Alan Jones, PA Industrial Correspondent
Press Association: Finance
source: PA
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