Axe swings at Toyota's Altona plant

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Axe swings at Toyota's Altona plant

From: AAP April 16, 2012 11:38AM

TOYOTA has begun sacking 350 workers at its Melbourne plant amid heavy security.

Security guards have been brought in to oversee the process, and workers are being ferried from the Altona carmaking plant to a reception centre across the road to be told the news.

Toyota says the 350 redundancies are all compulsory but a small number of workers have volunteered to be considered for redundancy.

According to union figures, 262 workers are being arbitrarily sacked over two days and 88 had volunteered for redundancies.

Australian Manufacturing Workers Union (AMWU) official Charlie Marmara said the tactics employed by Toyota, including calling in security guards and transporting workers across the road in vans, were heavy-handed.

"For me personally (it's) very difficult, for the people themselves very upsetting, a lot of people are uncertain now what the future holds for them," he told reporters outside the Altona plant.



"They didn't know until this morning. They came to work with their lunches, said goodbye to their wives and kids and they've come to work, tap on the shoulder, (brought) in here and terminated."

Mr Marmara said some of the sacked staff had worked for Toyota for 30 years.

About 80 per cent would appeal the decision to make them redundant.

Toyota spokeswoman Beck Angel said the redundancy strategy was absolutely not heavy-handed, adding that security had been stepped up at the union's request during the 10-week negotiating period.

She said staff were being informed shop by shop and transported across the road where there was more room.

"We're doing one-on-one meetings with everyone. We just don't have the facilities at the plant to facilitate them," Ms Angel said.

She added a small number of staff had volunteered to be considered for redundancies, but couldn't say exactly how many. Not everyone who put up their hand for a redundancy would have received one, she said.

Toyota will not discuss the details of the redundancy packages but the union says workers have been offered four weeks severance pay for every year of employment.

Charles Allen, who was among the first to go, said he was devastated to have lost his job after 18 years on the engine manufacturing line.

"I've been coming here for 18 years and that's all I know, so now I've got to look for something else," the 41-year-old Werribee man told Fairfax Radio.

Mr Allen said he dreaded driving home and telling his wife the news, but hoped his redundancy package would help the couple pay off their mortgage while he looked for a new job.

Toyota has blamed the high Australian dollar and a slump in export demand for the job cuts, first announced in January.

About 10 per cent of the Altona plant's workforce is being made redundant across its production, press, welding, painting and assembly shops.