Zuellig Pharma Solutions Service Korea (SSK) is suspected of enforcing early retirement or layoff on the SSK unionists in retaliation for striking, violating collective agreements with the Korea Democratic Pharmaceutical Union (KDPU).
On Monday, the KDPU said all workers dismissed from SSK would file a lawsuit to nullify the company’s “unfair” decision on the layoffs.
According to the KDPU, SSK informed employees on Dec. 22 that it would close down the Patient Care (PC) unit and used the early retirement program (ERP) to lay off all members of the company’s labor union on March 31.
SSK has two business units – the PC unit and the marketing unit. As the marketing team has been making operating losses, the company relied on the PC team’s operating profit. However, after the SSK labor union’s walkout, the company could not maintain the business and forced workers at the PC team to use ERP or laid them off, sources said.
All members of the SSK’s trade union belonged to the PC unit.
The KDPU said article 22 of the collective agreements stated that if the company has to reduce workforce due to abolition or withdrawal of a business unit, it should obtain the consent of the labor union.
Layoffs are extremely limited to cases where the company can no longer maintain the management-labor relations, such as bankruptcy, the KDPU said.
The management and labor established the collective agreements because they all had agreed that a multinational pharmaceutical company’s ERP could cause worries about job security among workers, the KDPU emphasized.
However, SSK CEO Erwan Vilfeu made no effort to improve the business environment and minimize the dismissal and carried out unilateral restructuring, saying in an e-mail that the labor union was responsible for making losses, the KDPU said.
According to the KDPU, the management notified layoffs at the end of last year. It only proposed the desired retirement benefits below the industry average in four negotiations with the trade union. Other than that, the management did not make any further effort to avoid layoffs, it added.
The management’s decision came less than two months after the workers went on a strike on Oct. 30, and the layoffs were retaliatory, the KDPU argued.
The KDPU’s SSK branch was formed on March 19, 2019, and all the 20 employees at the PC unit were members of the labor union. The majority of the workers owned nursing certifications, the KDPU said.
At the time of the conclusion of the collective agreement on May 22, 2020, Vilfeu acknowledged that the workers' wages were lower than those of the industry and promised to raise salaries in stages over the next several years, the KDPU went on to say.
However, he demanded a freeze in wages, citing financial difficulties at Zuellig Pharma Korea, and the wage bargaining broke down around October last year, it said.
The KDPU sought mediation with the Seoul Regional Labor Relations Commission on October 15, 2020, but the mediation failed as the management still wanted to keep wages unchanged.
After the labor union walked out based on the agreement of all of the labor union members, the company laid off only those in the PC unit where the union members belonged at the excuse of abolishing the business unit, the KDPU said.
“Immediately after the collective bargaining broke down, and on the same day when sought the mediation, the company suspended the branch union leader and ordered him to stand by for an appointment,” the KDPU said. “After the mediation failed, the company did the same to the secretary-general and the accounting auditor of the labor union.”
The management explained that it received an internal report of bullying involving the three leaders of the labor union but failed to present any evidence, the KDPU said.
The management’s act was to prevent a strike by excluding key members of the labor union. Still, the SSK branch union’s all members went on a strike from Oct. 30, 2020, to Nov. 15, 2020, in protest against the unfair crackdown on the labor union, the KDPU explained.
Out of the 20 members of the labor union, two left the company with ERP. The rest 18 workers decided to file a suit against SSK to fight the unfair layoffs, the KDPU said.
“We have completed the procedure for the appointment of a lawyer, and we will file the lawsuit with a court soon.”