Shorts workers threaten industrial action

Workers at troubled Belfast aerospace company Bombardier Shorts are threatening to begin industrial action at the weekend, it was revealed today.

The company has been notified the majority of the workforce will start an overtime ban on Saturday – there will also be restrictions on some of the procedures for recording work done.

Members of two of the trade unions at the factory – Amicus and the T&G – who represent nearly 4,000 of the 5,500 workforce, will be involved.

The threatened action comes after talks at the North's Labour Relations Agency, which ran late into last night, broke up without resolving long running disputes about pay, conditions and redundancies.

More than 1,000 jobs at what is Northern Ireland’s largest manufacturing employer are under threat by the Canadian parent company after the majority of workers earlier in the year rejected a four-year pay and conditions deal which involved a pay freeze in the first year.

The talks broke up in disharmony after only internal representatives of the two unions went to the discussions instead, as management had expected, the body which represents all unions at the factory.

Bombardier accused the unions of setting down “pre-conditions” before they would enter into negotiations on the pay contract renewal.

They said the trade unionists wanted the removal of contractually agreed afternoon shifts and no compulsory redundancies.

The afternoon shifts were introduced recently as a cost cutting exercise as they carry a smaller overtime premium than night shifts.

A company statement said they advised the shop stewards that “these and all other outstanding issues of concern should be addressed as part of the wage contract renewal negotiations with all trade unions under the auspices of the Labour Relations Agency as originally intended.”

It said the trade unions had been “unable to move from their fixed position.”

For their part the two unions said as two out of three unions had voted for industrial action, it was more appropriate if their shop stewards were the only union representatives to take part in the talks.

They insisted issues surrounding the threatened industrial action should be addressed first to pave the way for talks on wider issues.

Despite the impasse both sides say they remain committed to finding a resolution to the dispute, although how was uncertain.

Bombardier has been hard hit by the downturn in the aircraft industry following the September 11 terror attacks in the US and the global economic downturn.

Faced with falling orders the company earlier this year announced 1,180 redundancies. Already 600 jobs have gone, but the company has managed to reduce the remaining 580 jobs under threat to around 100.

A further 1,000 jobs are at risk after the workers voted in May to reject the four year pay deal proposed by the Canadian parent company.