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Strike talks beat Easter chaos
Page 7
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ATHREE-DAY pay strike by 750 Christian Salvesen drivers and warehouse staff threatened to cripple one of supermarket Morrisons' main depots. But it has been averted after the operator agreed to meet the GMB union.
The planned industrial action over the Easter weekend would have hit the Bellshill, Lanarkshire depot, which supplies 120 stores across Scotland. A meeting to prevent the threat of further action was being held as CM went to press. Negotiator Stephen Bane from the GMB says the pay row has been building up since last June: "Over 80% of workers rejected the original 3.75% pay offer and when we balloted for industrial action workers voted in favour of a strike by nine to one.
"Last week we faxed the company to warn them about the action," he reports. "Then they agreed that if we would postpone this they would enter into dialogue to resolve this matter, which we have done reluctantly."
Baillie warns that if negotiations break down the union will only be required to give Salvesen seven days' warning of further industrial action.
He concludes:-We are not being greedy—we just want parity on pay with others that do similar jobs."
Ray Barnes, Christian Salvesen's director of human resources, says the suspension of strike action will allow "meaningful negotiations" to take place.