Gone to pot (industrial action)
British Foods is a national company, which has amongst its production sites a food
processing plant at Wanden. Wanden is an old established industrial area and approximately
four hundred people are employed at the site. The Wanden site was taken over by British
Foods two years ago. There have been a number of redundancies at the site, partly because
of falling demand, but also because of capital investment made by the Group in an effort to
make the plant profitable. There has been a history of sporadic short industrial stoppages in
various parts of the plant. The Site Manager, Stanley Marsden, reports to the Group
Production Director. The Site Personnel Officer, Susan Osmond, reports to the Site Manager,
but also reports functionally to the Group Industrial Relations Adviser, George Ingram, on
industrial relations matters affecting manual employees.
One day one of the Fork Lift Truck Drivers, Fred Lewis, was seen smoking something which
was clearly not a cigarette. His Supervisor, who noticed this, called another supervisor and
they retrieved the remains of what Fred had been smoking from the side of the lorry that he
had been loading. The remains were sent for analysis to one of the local council departments
and found to be an illegal substance. Fred was subsequently asked to attend a Disciplinary
Hearing, at which he said he had only been smoking a normal cigarette. He added that he
had given up smoking ‘pot’ two years ago. He had been with the Company for eight years.
Fred’s explanation was not accepted and he was summarily dismissed by the Site Manager,
Stanley Marsden, for gross misconduct.
Almost immediately after the announcement of Fred Lewis’s dismissal, the site shop stewards
committee asked for an urgent meeting with Stanley Marsden. They expressed concern that
Fred Lewis had not been retained on full pay pending his internal appeal against dismissal.
The Union argued that the ‘status quo’ clause of the Disputes procedure should have applied
and that there should not have been any action, apart from paid suspension, until the
procedure had been exhausted. The Company’s response was that the Lewis case was a
disciplinary issue and was not covered by the Disputes procedure. However, there was,
somewhat surprisingly, no disciplinary procedure. The Group had tried to introduce one a
year ago but the stewards argued that it needed to be agreed with them. Eventually it was
decided to consult about the introduction of the standard group procedure but the consultation
procedure was still in its final stages. The Company proposed to hear Fred’s appeal under
this procedure. The meeting was adjourned on a somewhat acrimonious note. Stanley
Marsden and Susan Osmond decided that it would be prudent to brief the two production
shifts about what was actually happening. The briefing, carried out by line supervision, proved
easy enough with the morning shift, on which Lewis was employed, but the reception to the
afternoon briefing was hostile in some cases, including in the food essences section. Local
management thought that this might be, at least partly, because of the much tighter control
exercised by the afternoon shift supervisor. Employees who had changed shift pattern
maintained that the supervisor on the morning shift had a much more relaxed style. There
followed a further inconclusive meeting with the stewards, at which they argued that the
matter had now become a collective dispute, which they said was not surprising given the
issue of principle involved.
The next development was that the stewards explained to the rest of the work force that they
were unhappy with management’s intransigence and breach of procedure and some of them
also said it could be that employees would want to demonstrate their support for Fred Lewis
on an individual basis. The next day six of the employees mounted a picket outside the
entrance to the site in support of Fred Lewis, instead of reporting for work on the afternoon
shift. The six included the shop steward and three employees from the food essences section
and one other shop steward. Four of the six had ‘live’ disciplinary warnings. Stanley
Marsden’s reaction to this was to call the Union District Officer and tell him that he regarded
all six men as having dismissed themselves. The next day he saw the District Officer and was
adamant that the six men had sacked themselves. The District Officer explained that the men
had acted in frustration, because of the difficulty they had had in registering a ‘failure to agree’
about the issue of dismissed employees not being paid pending internal appeal against
dismissal. The meeting was adjourned and as a conciliatory gesture Stanley Marsden said
the six men would receive average wages pending further representations on their behalf.
This was partly in response to the District Officer’s argument that the ‘status quo’ should be
observed on collective dispute issues. It was also done, however, to ‘cool’ the industrial
relations climate at the site. The two further stages in the existing disputes procedure were
firstly one chaired by the Group Production Director and then a further stage chaired by the
Managing Director. Thereafter the parties could go to ACAS for conciliation and/or arbitration
by mutual agreement.
George Ingram, the Group Industrial Relations Adviser, then became involved. He arranged
to see Stanley Marsden and Susan Osmond. Stanley Marsden was still adamant that the six
must not return and added that it was now clear that there was relatively little support for their
action. A ‘mass’ meeting had been held to discuss the plight of the six, but only twelve other
people had attended. Stanley Marsden also explained that the Company had recently lost two
contracts because of what he believed had been sabotage in the food essences section caustic soda having been added to the essences. Stanley maintained that he had the support
of the Group Production Director in his stand. George knew however that the Group
Personnel Director was unhappy about the handling of the matter.
Fred Lewis’s appeal is due to be heard the next day and the resumed meeting with the
District Officer will take place the day after.
Question
Imagine you are George Ingram, the Group Industrial Relations Adviser. Advise!