Ag 01 july, 2015

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Wednesday, July 1, 2015

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Location key in calf kill decision BY SUE NEWMAN

SUE.N@THEGUARDIAN.CO.NZ

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Its central location has been a key factor in Silver Fern Farms Pareora works securing the company’s bobby calf kill this season at the expense of long term processor, Fairton. In a statement to the Guardian, Silver Fern Farms chief executive Dean Hamilton said that Pareora could cover the broader Canterbury region and if necessary, overflow from North Otago. It also won out because investment had already been made on the site in preparation for the new season, he said. When asked if this could be an indication Fairton was on the closure list, Mr Hamilton did not provide a reply. Fairton has been the major South Island bobby calf processing plant for

several years, said New Zealand Meat Workers and Related Trades Union Canterbury secretary Bill Watt, and to keep the work, staff had made a number of concessions each year in terms of conditions and pay rates, But this year the company made a request that staff could not accept, wanting to introduce a 10-day kill cycle using both Fairton and Pareora, and cutting penal rates for weekend work that was part of a shift. Staff at Fairton, Pareora and Finegand voted on the proposal and turned it down. On Monday Fairton staff were told by letter, that they had lost out on calf processing because they wouldn’t agree to work weekends without penal rates. However, the first many knew that the work had gone was when they

read about it in the Guardian, Mr Watt said. He believes Fairton has been unfairly singled out for its part in the three-shed vote, but said that Silver Fern did not know how staff voted, they simply knew the vote was 95 per cent in favour of rejecting the offer. “Their proposal was that the two plants did five-day weeks but I don’t believe this option was ever really available. They were playing one shed off against the other,” he said. “Fairton didn’t do anything that Pareora and Finegand didn’t do. The three sheds voted together, the company was unaware who voted which way.”

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