Hundreds of transport workers are protesting nationally at Aldi stores as the Transport Workers’ Union highlights dangerous practices in the supermarket’s transport supply chain, from lack of maintenance on vehicles to underpayments and worker injuries.
TWU investigations at Gold Tiger, a company within Aldi’s transport supply chain which has since closed its doors, have uncovered:
- Vehicles that were not properly maintained, in some cases leading to workers being permanently injured.
- Truck rollovers.
- Potential underpayments, including workers employed full-time but only paid if there was enough work.
The TWU is pursuing an underpayment case at the company, which has also previously been taken to court by the Fair Work Ombudsman over failure to pay unfair dismissal compensation.
Dangerous history
Other incidents uncovered by the TWU at Aldi stores and through its supply chain include workers crushed and trapped in a scissor lift in Aldi’s Balgowlah store on three separate occasions. At other companies in its supply chain, TWU has uncovered trucks being held together by tape, workers hit by forklifts, and vehicle collisions in Aldi DCs
While Woolworths and Coles have both signed charters with the TWU on supply chain safety, Aldi has failed to follow suit.
The national Aldi protests come as hundreds of Enterprise Agreements begin to expire across road transport in the TWU’s largest co-ordinated industrial campaign, triggering a window for potential protected action.
TWU National Secretary Michael Kaine said, ‘Throughout Aldi’s transport supply chain there are shocking tales of injuries, dangerous vehicle standards, underpayments and pressure to rush. Aldi has still failed to commit to a charter to address these issues riddled throughout the transport companies it uses to move its goods.
‘There are now almost 40,000 transport workers who have the potential right to take industrial action to lift standards in Australia’s deadliest industry. With 23 truck drivers killed on our roads this year, workers have made it clear: it’s time for clients like Aldi to come to the table on decent jobs that don’t pile deadly pressure on an industry already at breaking point.
‘Inaction from transport workers means more deaths on our roads and decent transport companies pushed out from the constant race to the bottom.’
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