Unison, Unite and GMB continue to fight for trade union recognition by Carmarthenshire Council’s Cwm Environmental, after three years of negotiation.
The revelation comes a week before International Workers’ Memorial Day, April 28th, a day where we remember those who lost their lives at work, or from work-related injury and disease.
Councillor Rob James, Opposition Leader on Carmarthenshire Council, first raised the issue on the 14th of November 2018 after the governance and management structures of Cwm Environmental Limited, were changed to a Teckal company.
Cwm Environmental Ltd are an arms-length council-owned company that manages Carmarthenshire Council’s four recycling centres – Nantycws, Trostre, Wernddu and Whitland.
Local union representatives have stated that the company are now refusing to provide policy documents to the unions when supporting their members, due to the ongoing negotiations.
The Carmarthenshire Labour Leader has blasted the Plaid Cymru administration for their failure to recognise trade unions for the Council-owned companies.
Cllr Rob James stated “I am astonished that this Plaid Cymru Council continue to refuse to recognise trade unions for it’s company. Trade unions are essential to ensuring that are council workers are fairly treated in the workplace and with waste management being such a difficult environment to work in, this representation is essential.
“We first heard of this issue three years ago and raised it Full Council to ensure that it was acted upon. We now find out that not only are trade unions still not recognised, but that our council employees cannot be fairly represented, as the company are refusing to provide their representatives with company policies.
“This is absolute shambles. We have been campaigning for the last two years for a recycling centre in the Llangadog area, after Plaid Cymru essentially closed the one in the north of Carmarthenshire. With this latest revelation, it appears that Plaid Cymru’s management of waste facilities has been a mess.
“This needs sorting straight away – allow trade unions to represent our council workers to ensure they are safe in the workplace.”
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