On December 1, 2022, we had a periodic consultation with your employer. During this conversation, we were told by the employer that the periodic salary increases that are applied every year on January 1 have been postponed to March 1, 2023. This seems to be a decision of the VDL Groep that applies to all VDL companies. Your employer indicated that they also support this decision and will act in line with it.
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We are unpleasantly surprised by this because we were not informed earlier. Based on our good relationship with the employer, we expected that we would at least be formally informed.
We have asked the employer not to blindly implement this measure, but to first consult with us about the reason for the decision and the adverse consequences for the employment conditions for the employees. Namely, this periodic salary influences the determination of the pension base of any year and affects the incomes of the employees concerned.
As a result, the employees in question will miss out on a higher pensionable salary, which means that the employer is acting in violation of the collective labor agreement. In our view, this is contrary to article 7.4.2 of the collective labor agreement, which describes how to act if an employer wishes to deviate from the collective labor agreement in an unfavorable sense. Unfortunately, the employer did not respond to this.
A second subject that we raised during the consultations mentioned above was about the current social plan. We have already asked the employer several times to consult with us about a new social plan in accordance with the agreement stated in the current social plan. Which is in fact “That if it turns out that continuity is not feasible, or if the realization of cooperation with a new customer has important consequences for employees, the parties to this redundancy plan will consult with each other again.”
Your employer does not agree with us because he believes there is continuity of work at VDL Nedcar after the end of the BMW period. According to him, serious discussions are still ongoing with all kinds of parties. Unfortunately, the employer cannot indicate what this entails in concrete terms and what it will yield for the future of all employees at VDL Nedcar.
This is precisely the reason why we now want to consult with the employer to provide a better safety net and security for the employees, should it not be possible to continue the work. We hope you don't need the social plan! But in our opinion this also offers a certain certainty for the employees and brings a little more peace of mind to the organization.
Despite this, the employer refused to accede to our request. For this reason, we have communicated our formal position on both issues to the employer by letter and asked for a response. We also informed him that in the event of a negative response, we would consider taking further (legal) steps to bring the employer to the table for consultation.
Unfortunately, the employer's response was again negative on both counts. The employer believes that he does not need to talk to us or to the works council about a new social plan and postponement of the periodic salary increase.
Based on this, we will now, together with the other trade unions, look at what steps we could take to change the employer's mind. Given the business closure for the next two weeks, that will probably be after that period. We will keep you informed.
Contact
If you have any questions regarding this, you can contact the representative Suat Koetloe via suat.koetloe@unie.nl or call 06-5252 2061.
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