Visteon protestors continue sit-in
WORKERS at the Visteon car parts plant in west Belfast have spent a second night occupying the factory in a protest over redundancy terms and conditions.
Scores of workers again staged an overnight sit-in at the Dunmurry facility. On Tuesday, the US-owned company called in administrators who announced that "substantial losses'' had left them with no option but to close the factory, with the loss of 210 jobs.
The protest has spread to two of the company's other operations in the UK where workers were also made redundant after KPMG were called in.
There were protests at factories in Basildon, Essex, and Enfield, north London. In total, 560 workers across the three locations have lost their jobs.
The protestors claim that Visteon's former owner and main customer, Ford, had promised redundancy contracts which they now want to see honoured.
Visteon was separated from Ford in 2000, but reported losses totalling 669 million in the years after the split. The workers say Ford agreed to honour redundancy agreements after the separation, but was now reneging on the arrangement.
They want the guarantees on pay and conditions to be upheld.
Union leaders say that because the company is now in administration the workers will receive only statutory redundancy payments.
KPMG said Visteon was being subsidised by its American parent group, which is the biggest creditor of the collapsed firm and is owed more than 400 million.
Depending on length of service, workers are entitled to statutory redundancy, which is capped at 350 a week and runs for a maximum of 30 weeks, said KPMG. Only staff who have been employed by Visteon for two years or more will qualify for redundancy.
Many of the workers who occupied the Dunmurry plant spent the night in the canteen, with food and liquids being brought to them by family and friends.
Jimmy Kelly, from the Unite union in Northern Ireland, said the protestors were prepared to stay for as long as it took to resolve the issue.
He added: "Quite a lot of these employees have spent their working lives at this company. To be rewarded with their jobs being extinguished at a stroke of an administrator's pen is not the way to be treated.
"The loss of these jobs for the west Belfast area is a hammer blow to the community, which has been hard-pressed to see well-paid and skilled employment locate there.''
Mr Kelly said workers at the factory "deserved fairer treatment" from Visteon and Ford and a better redundancy package to see them through the tough times ahead.
"Unite vows to battle on to see that this is done," he added.
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Weather for Belfast
Tuesday 29 May 2012
Today
Sunny spells
Temperature: 12 C to 21 C
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