Tannery workers strike
Uruguayan tannery workers downed tools and stopped work for 24 hours on February 13 in protest over their employers’ failure to comply with a salary agreement signed last November.
Under the deal, tannery owners agreed to increase wages, and backdate the rise to July 2007. However, this has not been the case despite the Tannery Workers Union (UOC) having held meetings with delegates from the Leather Industry Chamber and National Department for Employment to discuss the overdue pay.
The UOC claims that eight tanneries have failed to implement the collective agreement and that some tanneries also still owe employees their “Christmas Box” (a bonus of an extra month’s salary at the end of the year) as well as holiday pay, while at one tannery some 16 workers are not even receiving their monthly salary.
The UOC is now demanding that a 'negotiation table' be set up in order to discuss the crisis and workers are threatening to occupy tannery buildings if no solution is found within the next few weeks.
