Steel company defends move to cut 480

Steel company defends move to cut 480
Published on Dec 12, 2015, 8:17 pm AST
By Asha Javeed


IN the face of calls to reinstate employees, steel pro­­ducer ArcelorMittal is defending its decision to cut its staff by 480 workers.

The Point Lisas company said late on Friday night that there has been misinformation in the public domain by leaders of the Steel Workers Union of Trinidad and Tobago (SWUTT) and others.

In particular, the number of staff it has had to shed.

That number is 480 and not 600.

On Friday, Joint Trade Union Movement (JTUM) members said it was not willing to accept the reasons given by the steel company for sending home the workers until January 15, with a $2,000 stipend.

But ArcelorMittal contends that's a “completely untrue and misleading” picture.

Major losses while operating

With regard to mana­gers, ArcelorMittal explained that those with accrued vacation dates took up the company's offer to proceed on paid vacation leave while those without accrued vacation leave have been engaged to do alternative work at the Point Lisas plant.

The company said it has suffered major financial los­ses for seven of its ten years of operation.

“With all the turmoil and uncertainty in the inter­na­tional steel market, the company has not laid off or retrenched any of its perma­nent workforce in recent times, and has only laid off workers in December as a last resort, as emphasised by the Minister of Labour, while resisting exerting additional pressure on the local economy,” it said.

In talks with union

ArcelorMittal said it had initiated discussions with the union since February 2015, “with numerous exchanges continuing on issues rela­ting to the company's cost of production and the key drivers in this regard before the company was forced to make the decision to revise its footprint in May 2015, to reduce its operations to two DRI plants from three and to one-line operation in the rolling mill and steel plant”.

ArcelorMittal said these footprint changes were made without laying off or retrenching its permanent manpower levels, and the com­pany engaged SWUTT in discussions at every step of the way.

“The lay-offs came only after the SWUTT was asked to present to workers a proposal from the company to proceed on accrued vacation days till mid-January with pay, as they are entitled to in their industrial agreement, and any worker without sufficient holidays would be employed in alternative duties,” it said.

ArcelorMittal said its records showed continuing de­clines in the production of steel products over the last year due to uncompetitive costs.

High labour costs

The company in turn no­ted its own challenge with its workers—a high absenteeism rate of over ten per cent.

“This rate increased to over 13 per cent overall and to 18 per cent amongst weekly paid employees du­ring the month of November, once the company signed the memorandum of agreement for alternative duties with the SWUTT,” it said.

The company said its labour costs over the last five years have been in the highest percentile of companies within the ArcelorMittal Group.

Fall in steel prices, demand

“These figures give a true picture of the operations of ArcelorMittal at Point Lisas and erase the false picture being painted by the union that the company has been making large amounts of profit and exploiting labour.

“The extremely difficult financial situation at Arcelor­Mittal has been caused by oversupply of steel on the international market by China and the crash in pri­ces for steel. The soft prices and a major reduc­tion in the number of orders received for products by ArcelorMittal at Point Lisas have impacted severely on the financial and production operations of the company,” it said.

Appeal from PM


On Friday, Prime Minister Dr Keith Rowley appealed to ArcelorMittal and other companies in Trinidad and Tobago not to use retrenchment and closure as a first resort in dealing with the economic hurdles which will come their way “in this period of challenges”.

The Prime Minister also disclosed in the House of Representatives that the Government planned to intervene in the ArcelorMittal matter by having the Minister of Labour (Jennifer Baptiste-Primus) meet with both the union and the employer.

The company has met with Finance Minister Colm Imbert and explained with a mea­sure of detail the state of the international steel market and the losses being incurred at its Point Lisas plant, it said.

ArcelorMittal also wrote to the Min­ister of Labour in October, seeking a similar meeting.