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Boral suspends Kempsey Plant production

Jul, 03 2009

(New South Wales, Australia)  --  The housing industry slump has led to a New South Wales mid-north coast brick-making plant being mothballed.

Building and construction materials supplier Boral will temporarily suspend production at its Kempsey plant.

The executive general manager, Nick Clark, says the weak housing market in NSW is to blame.

He says the plant has enough unsold stock to last for up to two years.

"The NSW housing market is down about 50 per cent from its peak in 2003 and also down about 20 per cent from last year and that's the market that the Kempsey plant predominantly supplies," he said.

"There's 19 employees affected. All the employees will be paid their entitlements in full and we will work with them to try and find other work."

Enterprise agreement

Meanwhile, Boral says it is hoping to negotiate a new enterprise agreement with drivers in its concrete business.

Employees from concrete plants at Toormina and Port Macquarie have joined a state-wide campaign against Boral.

The Transport Workers Union says the company has offered its concrete transporters a small increase at the expense of overtime entitlements.

A 24-hour strike was held on Monday and the union has not ruled out more industrial action.

Under the current proposals, Boral is offering employees pay rises of 6 per cent over the next two years. In exchange, it wants to introduce new working practices including staggered starting hours between 6:00am AEST and 8:00am.

Boral says the change is necessary to ensure its competitiveness in the marketplace and to help protect existing jobs.















Source: www.abc.net.au