The long history of the Palencia town of Venta de Baños with the Siro biscuit industry seems to have come to an end. Yesterday, the company announced to the workers its intention to close the plant dedicated to the manufacture of this product due to the “lack of competitiveness that makes its future unfeasible” within the company, which has three other special employment centers and a warehouse that distributes to all of Spain in the same Palencia municipality -these will continue to be active- and two other plants in Aguilar de Campoo, also in Palencia, and in Toro (Zamora).
There it intends to derive all its cookie production with the consequent transfer of a good part of the 197 jobs -50 could stay in Venta de Baños-, a measure that would be carried out “progressively over the next 24 months”, according to the company in a statement. release.
All this within the framework of the Competitiveness Plan that has been negotiating for months with the representatives of the workers of all the work centers and that, according to Siro, “is an essential requirement for the entry of the investment partner, the only way out of the situation that the company”. A delicate situation with a debt of around 300 million and for which already in 2021 he set out to find a financial ally that could provide a future.
After announcing the entry of an investment fund, another was finally chosen in March of this year, Davison Kempner and Afendis, which requires an agreement with the workers and which, according to Siro, is “imperative to reach urgently in the coming days » so that they inject 180 million euros and become the largest shareholder with 75 percent of the company. In this situation, the offer for the almost 200 workers of Venta de Baños is “to achieve the best conditions and with the least impact for the affected workforce,” they said in the statement, with the possibility of relocation of all employees in the Community and ” For those who do not want to be relocated, the conditions agreed with the Works Council and the company in a meeting with the Serla de Castilla y León on March 10 will apply» -33 days per year worked with a maximum of 20 annual payments -.
Negotiations with the squad took place yesterday morning without an agreement. The president of the Company Committee, María del Mar Rodríguez, rejected that the Palencia plant is not competitive. “What happens is that they don’t want to invest in it,” she said, before showing her opposition to the cookie firm’s transfer proposal because they are “unaffordable.”
“In many cases they would be charging less and in a lower category than the one they have here,” she assured, still surprised because a closing announcement is not expected. “For a month they have not given us information and they said that they were going to negotiate the competitiveness plan plant by plant,” she said, and it was last Monday when they resumed contact to inform them that the plant was going to end its activity. “And now they want us to negotiate everything in four hours,” she stressed before indicating that the company has not set a date for another meeting.
In the case of Aguilar de Campoo, most of its 326 workers supported in an assembly the pre-agreement reached with the company to improve competitiveness and the same has happened in the special employment centers, with which voting is pending. for your acceptance. On the other hand, the Toro Company Committee yesterday planned to put the agreement to a vote until late at night and the forecast is that it will go ahead not without some criticism from the union centrals, who consider that the new conditions will suppose a loss of rights for its around 300 workers.
The Board awaits an agreement
“This is a very difficult decision, but we are at a key moment for the company in which reality must prevail over emotion,” Siro also assured about his decision to lower the blind at the Venta de Baños biscuit plant, which, according to its data, drags a “lack of competitiveness” that condemns it to closure. “It has a salary cost 29 percent higher than the average of the rest of the plants that the company has in Spain, a level of absenteeism of 18.2 percent over an average of 6 in the region,” according to the company’s argument , which the workers flatly rejected.
The Board, through the Minister of Economy and Finance, Carlos Fernández Carriedo, wanted the company, investors and workers to reach an agreement that allows the continuity of the plant. The regional government spokesman also defended that the Board “always” has been in contact and supporting Siro, and they hope that an agreement will be reached to know “to what extent” his support is necessary, reports Ical.
