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Betz recruits Brits
Page 6
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Controversial German haulier Willi Betz is set to expand in the UK and recruit its first British drivers. Guy Sheppard reports.
EUROPEAN TRANSPORT giant Willi Betz, frequently condemned for its use of low-paid East European labour, is planning to recruit scores of UK drivers on wages of £8 an hour.
Union leaders have often accused the company of employing low-paid drivers from outside the European Union, but Betz management stresses these drivers will be based in the UK.
Job adverts have appeared around its depots in Shenstone in Staffordshire and Newport Pagnell in Buckinghamshire, where Betz opened its first UK depots last year (CM 25 November).
Since then the company has relied on agency drivers to deliver parts to the Toyota car factory near Derby; now up to 80 drivers are needed at Shenstone with another 15 at Newport Pagnell.
Simon Lings, UK automotive business manager for Betz, says: "One of the reasons we want to recruit is to reduce costs. It's far easier and cheaper to use your own people," He adds that the rates offered to drivers employed at Shenstone will be £8 an hour for a guaranteed 45-hour week with overtime paid after 40 hours.
"The hourly rate for night-time working will be £10/hr.
reckon it's about the going rate here," says Lings. "It's higher than some and less than others."
The West Midlands Joint Industrial Council rate — agreed by the Road Haulage Association and the Transport & General Workers Union — is currently £8.30/hr.
Lings explains that the work involves collecting parts forToyota in southern England and delivering to the company's on-site support partner,Transfreight.
"The customer will not have European drivers," he adds.-They insist on UK-based drivers."
Jimmy Hill, a T&G branch secretary representing drivers in the West Midlands, is still hoping a test case against Betz will force it to pay the National Minimum Wage to Eastern European drivers working in the UK (CM 11 March 2004).
-Betz drivers have told us that they only get paid when the wheels are turning and they're parked up weeks at a time waiting for work," he says.