Coffee giant JDE is again moving to `fire and rehire’ nearly 300 workers at its Banbury, UK coffee plant. The threat came shortly before JDE Peet’s CEO stated, “In an unprecedented year, JDE Peet’s employees and partners worked tirelessly to serve our loved coffee and tea brands to consumers across the six continents. I would like to thank the teams who rallied together, supported communities with initiatives across 30 countries, while ensuring the health and safety of our employees.” But, at JDE’s Banbury (UK) factory, these thanks have come in the form of more attacks on union members’ livelihoods.
- In early 2020, Unite, with support from the IUF and its JDE / JAB Holding affiliates, successfully campaigned to challenge the company’s plan to unilaterally dismiss the entire workforce and reemploy workers who had been issued an ultimatum by JDE to submit to inferior pay and conditions
- On February 25, 2021, before collective bargaining negotiations could be concluded, JDE again issued collective redundancy notifications to Unite the Union, indicating the company’s intention to fire and rehire 291 workers under inferior terms & conditions at its Banbury, UK coffee plant
- Unite JDE members have voted by 96 per cent in a consultative ballot to hold a full-scale industrial action ballot, with the option to strike, in response to JDE issuing notice of dismissal and engagement for 291 employees
- The IUF will again through the JDE Peet’s/JAB Holding Network be organizing support messages for the JDE Banbury workers and Unite’s fightback
Unite the Union representative Joe Clarke said, “Unite is prepared for constructive talks with the management on the plant’s future, but the threat of ‘fire and rehire’ needs to be taken off the table for such negotiations to take place–goodwill needs to be shown.”
