Cadbury's Strike Ballot

Workers at Cadburys will begin voting on strike action tomorrow over the firm's broken pay promises.

Unite said that Cadbury is breaking a long-standing deal struck with the workers at plants at Bourneville, Chirk, Marlbrook and Somerdale by refusing to honour the final year of a three-year pay agreement.

Unite national officer Jennie Formby said that the company could avert industrial action by keeping its promise to the workforce.

"The workers are angry that, while Cadbury's managers and shareholders carve up a hefty 30 per cent leap in profits, made by the hard work of the employees, workers are left choking on the crumbs. This is a derisory half per cent in their pay packets," she said.

"It is unacceptable that a company as profitable as Cadbury seeks to use a recession to snatch back money meant for workers.

"We ask Cadbury now to honour its commitments because these workers deserve nothing less than the fair pay they were promised."

Unite said that the ballot will be forced to exclude workers at Cadbury's Somerdale site because of a punitive clause in their redundancy agreement, meaning that the workers forfeit all enhanced redundancy payments if they take any industrial action.

"The pay issue is particularly important for the Somerdale workers because they were counting on the 2 per cent pay increase to enhance not just their last earnings with the company before their factory closes and production goes to Poland but also to boost their final redundancy pay.

"They may be being denied a voice in this process but Unite will still fight for the best deal for them," Ms Formby said.

Cadbury had originally agreed a deal of RPI plus 0.5 per cent with the workforce, with a minimum of two per cent for 2009.

However, as RPI in February was 0 per cent, the company is breaking the original agreement and instead imposing a deal of 0.5 per cent.

This comes despite the 30 per cent leap in profits across the company this year.