The workers committee at Israel Chemicals (TASE: ICL: NYSE: ICL) subsidiary Bromine Compounds today announced that negotiations on management's demands for cost-cutting layoffs had reached a dead end.
Bromine Compounds workers committee chairman Avner Ben-Senior said, "We have seen once again that the company's future is not the highest priority for management. As far as management is concerned, as long as there are no layoffs, there is no cost cutting. Management is proving that it will do anything, including harming the workers, in order to take revenge on the country for the Sheshinski Committee recommendations, while disrupting orderly work."
Two months ago, Israel Chemicals management summoned 144 workers at Bromine Compounds in Neot Hovav for a pre-layoff hearing. Israel Chemicals said the measure was part of the company's cost-cutting measures, following the crisis in the global bromine market, slow growth, and lower prices, in addition to the cabinet decision to adopt the Sheshinski Committee recommendations requiring Israel Chemicals to pay a 42% excess profits tax starting in 2017. Israel Chemicals says that following implementation of the recommendations in two years, it will pay the state taxes totaling NIS 2.5 billion per year, and therefore must adapt its business to the new tax environment.
The planned layoffs at Bromine Compounds, however, were canceled following a petition filed by the workers at the Beersheva District Labor Court, after which the parties were ordered to conduct intensive negotiations in an attempt to reach agreement. According to Ben-Senior, the company rejected proposals made by the workers committee for the early retirement of dozens of workers, and took unilateral measures, such as eliminating transportation for workers doing overtime, eliminating work positions, etc.
"The negotiations are being conducted in a ridiculous way, bordering on disgraceful," Ben-Senior said. In view of the impasse reached in the dialogue between the parties, the workers committee today petitioned the Beersheva District Labor Court to withdraw its previous petition against the layoffs at the company, following which they had been sent to negotiate with management. The committee said that withdrawing the petition would release them from any obligation to negotiate with management.
Israel Chemicals said in response, "Company management has been conducting intensive, comprehensive, and thorough consultation with the workers committee, during which a great deal of material was provided about the cost-cutting plans. Unfortunately, the workers committee is employing deliberate stalling and foot dragging tactics, and doing everything possible to foil the required cost-cutting measures. Lately, the committee did not even bother to attend further talks with management. This is a crude breach of the District Labor Court's ruling concerning the extent of the talks with management and the frequency of the meetings. The workers' petition to the Labor Court to withdraw their first petition indicates that the consultation process has been exhausted. Company management must implement the cost-cutting plans, and will act accordingly."
Published by Globes [online], Israel business news - www.globes-online.com - on January 28, 2015
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