WHEN: TODAY 10am Wednesday June 1, 2022
WHERE: Golden Circle, Earnshaw Road, NORTHGATE, QLD 4013
VISUALS: Workers wearing straw hats and carrying pineapples with union banners and signs and chanting outside their workplace.
WHO: Workers and UWU spokesperson Martin De Rooy, QLD Lead Organiser will be available for interview.
Essential Queensland food manufacturing workers at Golden Circle will stop work today over the company’s proposal that workers take a real wage cut of more than 3% each year.
Despite loyally working throughout the pandemic and recent floods in Queensland, workers are being offered between 2% and 2.5% in a four-year proposal, while cost of living rises more than 5%.
Golden Circle’s Queensland site is the only facility in Australia that produces canned pineapple slices, as well as the popular selection of Golden Circle juices and juice boxes.
Workers want a decent pay rise that won’t leave them falling behind compared with the cost of living, and fair breaks for workers on the grueling Pineapple lines who have suffered through extreme weathers to continue providing the company staple.
Golden Circle is a subsidiary of one of the world’s largest good and beverage companies, the billion-dollar Kraft Heinz Company. Kraft Heinz grew their international sales by 3.1% to $5.6 billion in 2021.
Quotes attributable to Martin De Rooy, QLD Lead Organiser for United Workers Union:
“This is a David and Goliath battle between Queensland workers and one of the world’s largest and most profitable food companies, Kraft Heinz.
“These essential workers ensured well-known Golden Circle products were on our shelves for families throughout the pandemic and floods.
“In return for their hard work during exceptional circumstances Golden Circle wants to give them a massive real wage cut.”
Quotes attributable to Natasha Wisniewski, UWU delegate and worker at Golden Circle for 23 years:
“We are just asking for a fair go after we turned up every day through pandemics and floods and everything else.
“We are taking action because we don’t think it’s fair that we fall so far behind as cost-of-living skyrockets.”
NOTE: Everyone attending this event will be expected to adhere to the COVID Safe Plan in place at the site
ENDS
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