Pick n Pay braces for strike

On Monday, trade union SACCAWU (SA Commercial, Catering and Allied Workers Union) bemoaned several recent labour disputes with Pick n Pay recently.

The union warned the supermarket giant's refusal to meet the union's demand of R500 across the board increases and a minimum of R3 000 for a one-year term could trigger "massive rolling strike action".

Pick n Pay's offer, according to the union, stands at R320 with a minimum of R2 575 for a one-year term.

The union - which warned of a fundamental shift in the attitude of Pick n Pay towards SACCAWU - also took issue with the cost of Pick n Pay's recent rebranding and change of logo both for its cost and "dearth of creativity".

SACCAWU said: "This process is driven by overpaid foreign consultants and foreign national recruited into strategic management positions. Everybody seems to be in agreement the horrible new logo is not worth the R110m?"

The union added: "The company now pleads poverty yet it recently opened several hypermarkets and other stores. Now, when hard toiling workers and their union put forward reasonable wage demands, the company uses the costs of restructuring as an excuse to deprive workers of a decent wage increase."

SACCAWU said if Pick n Pay failed to meet the union's reasonable demands "a fierce showdown is inevitable".

SACCUWU added that Pick n Pay chairperson Raymond Ackerman recently urged businesses to show more compassion for communities in which they operated.

The union said Ackerman had argued that business should put less emphasis on profits and more on their customers.

"In the meantime his managers are doing their damnedest to deny workers reasonable increases in the face of extreme hardships they faced with growing interests rates, inflation, food, energy and fuel increases that had a devastating effect on the living standards of working-class families."

Activist concerns

The union seems to have found an unlikely ally in corporate activist. Botha told a Black Management Forum meeting at the weekend that he asked Pick n Pay directors at the annual general meeting in June why employee turnover increased by 40%.

This, Botha pointed out, meant that the company had lost 5 000 employees in one year - perhaps signifying that staff were unhappy.

Botha also told the BMF gathering that he found it strange that Pick n Pay had no broad based black empowerment in place even though the company was extensively supported by black consumers.

Botha told Fin24.com on Monday that black ownership on the JSE would be less in 20 years' time because companies like Pick n Pay were seemingly not interested in black investors taking an equity stake in their business.

He argued that it was ironic that companies like Pick n Pay would ensure their entire supplier base was BEE compliant when it was debatable whether Pick n Pay was truly BEE compliant.

Botha pointed out that Pick n Pay would be relying increasingly on black spending power into the future "but yet they have no black director on their holding company (Pick n Pay Holdings) or a black executive director at the Pick n Pay Stores level."

Botha says that as Pick n Pay was four decades old with 35 000 employees the absence of black executive directors was conspicuous. "Surely some black employees could have reached these ranks in 40-odd years?"

- Fin24.com