Trade union Solidarity and South African steel producer Iscor appear to be headed for further conflict over the exact number of people the company wants to retrench. Solidarity spokesperson Dirk Hermann said the union wanted to know exactly how many people Iscor planned to retrench at all its plants throughout South Africa.
“We want to negotiate all the retrenchments, but Iscor does not want to tell us how many people will be affected,” he said.
“We feel very strongly about it. We want the total figure,” he said.
In its report on Iscor retrenchments released last week, the union said it suspected that Iscor planned to retrench about 2 051 people, and was hiding the figures to avert a strike.
According to the union the company has retrenched about 30 000 people over the past five years, and this caused “tremendous hardship” in areas such as Pretoria West and Vanderbijlpark.
Iscor on Thursday disputed the report by Solidarity on company retrenchments as “misdirected” as it was asking for macro-economic changes, which was entirely outside the control of the private sector.
Iscor said the union’s report sketched an ideal high-growth economic scenario in which there would be little need for retrenchments based on the following suppositions:
If there was a “realistic exchange” rate;
If the government “reviews economic policy to favour economic growth”;
If there is an “increase in government spending on economic and social
infrastructure”.
“All of these fall outside the immediate sphere of influence of the private sector and resides firmly under the control of the authorities,” the company said in a statement.
“We are obliged to conclude that the union is knocking at the wrong door. The evidence assembled, we believe, does not support the conclusion that private sector companies are not acting fairly in looking at cost reductions, including redundancies — given the current state of the domestic economy, the flux in the world steel market as well as the strength of the South African currency.”
Hermann said Iscor’s reluctance to release the figures was a public relations stunt.
“We are aware that they don’t want us to strike. All the shop stewards are angry,” he said.
He added that he was in possession of a letter which indicated that Iscor planned to retrench about 820 people, with 500 of them in Newcastle and 320 at the Iscor head office.
Solidarity’s Adam Jacobs said it was not a wise decision to retrench workers to cut costs and to make the company profitable.
“Don’t cut people’s heads. That is the absolute last resort,” he said. He argued that it was people who drove the economy.
“Correct the working of the economy. Let us do everything in our power to grow the economy,” he said.
Solidarity chief executive Flip Buys said not every South African eligible to be active in the economy would find work even if the economy grew by 5% per year for the next 20 years.
Adams said: “We need a growth rate of eight percent. I think that is a bit tough, but it is not impossible.” – I-Net Bridge