Workers Revolutionary Party - Gate Gourmet sacked workers picket TGWU office

The News Line: News Saturday, 6 May 2006 Gate Gourmet sacked workers picket TGWU office

Gate Gourmet sacked workers outside Hillingdon TGWU office on Friday insisting that their dispute is still on and that they need their hardship pay

GATE Gourmet locked-out workers picketed the Hillingdon Regional Office of the Transport and General Workers Union yesterday.

They told fellow union members that their employment tribunals for unfair dismissal were starting soon and that they were demanding that the union reinstate their hardship payments.

Parmjeet Sidhu told News Line: ‘Tony Woodley (TGWU General Secretary) said at first that we all came out together and we would all go back together, since then he’s done everything against us and stopped the union hardship payments on January 6th.’

Mohinder Virk said: ‘When you are attacked you have to stand up and fight, today we have come to ask for the union to support us, lots of people support us and are very angry that Tony Woodley has stopped our hardship money.’

Mussarat Saeed said: ‘We are still fighting for our rights and we are going to win.

‘For seven years I have worked at Gate Gourmet and then they picked me for compulsory redundancy, saying I’ve got no skill, that’s disgusting and whenever I come here the union solicitor tells me I should sign the Compromise Agreement.

‘The union officers are double faced, they should fight for their members.’

Raksha Sharma added: ‘The employment tribunal cases are starting to move forward from Friday 12th of May, we were all unfairly dismissed and all our cases must be heard. We are really struggling, now it’s nearly nine months and we’ve had no hardship payments since January, I’m getting nothing from social security either.’

Marie Silver, a journalist stopped to make a donation, she said: ‘I support these ladies they have been treated so badly, the bosses want slave labour and the union should fight against it, not help the bosses to bring it in.’