Unite ballots on Iggesund strike action

But trade union Unite has hit back at the redundancies and said the Swedish firm had “not acted in the spirit of the national agreement with the Confederation of Paper Industries”.

Unite national office Peter Ellis said Unite had held meetings attended by 200 people who wanted to fight the redundancies and “secure a reasonable severance payment” more in line with the industry agreement.

“We think Iggesund is behaving against an agreement that it supported and want a package that allows for voluntary redundancies from across the business and the possibility to retrain for those who want to stay,” he said.

An Iggesund spokesman told Packaging News the decision to close the plant made it necessary to reduce the workforce and that some staff had already accepted the package.

“We know we’ve offered a redundancy package that at least 50 people think is interesting, and are informing our customers that we don’t see any risk to supply,” he said.

Iggesund announced it was shutting the number two paper machine last month and has been in negotiations with workers since, the spokesman said.

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