Asda Agency Staff Win Pay Breakthrough

Unite has stepped up the pressure on supermarket bosses exploiting agency workers after signing a breakthrough deal on workers' rights with Asda stores.

The agreement between Unite and Asda - owned by US Wal-Mart corporation - aims to end the discrimination suffered by thousands of meat and poultry workers labouring for the supermarket's suppliers.

The union's three-year organising campaign among abattoir and meat-processing workers exposed what Unite DGS Jack Dromey described as "harsh and divisive conditions" in the companies that produce meat for high street supermarkets.

"In many cases, a permanent two-tier workforce had been created, one where mainly migrant agency workers are on even lower pay and worse conditions than the directly employed workers," Jack said.

Unite's agreement with Asda will allow the union to bring an end to what Mr Dromey described as the "semi-permanent employment status" of more than 6,000 agency workers in the meat industry.

"For years supermarkets have driven down costs, with thousands of workers paying the price with discriminatory practices," he stressed.

"It is wrong to exploit migrant agency workers on poorer conditions of employment and it is wrong to undercut directly employed workers on better conditions - that divides the workforce," Mr Dromey added.

An investigation into discrimination in the meat industry by the Equality and Human Rights Commission is due to report later this month and Mr Dromey welcomed Asda bosses' decision to "act and not wait" for the results of the inquiry.

"It is a matter of regret that for most of Asda's competitors the word 'ethical' is not put seriously into practice," he added.