Workers at the Cloughmills-based road haulage firm Reid Transport near Ballymena, were forced into a virtual occupation of the company premises in order to ensure payment of wages and holiday pay and entitlement to redundancy, after being informed that the firm had been taken into administration with the loss of 200 jobs.

This was despite being earlier advised unequivocally by the managing director, Mr Liam Reid, that the company was not in trouble. In reality Reid Transport has been sinking under more than £3 million of debt since 2005, thus incurring more than £200,000 costs in annual interest alone!
Administration investigations showed that this had been the situation for the last few years of trading and recent attempts to sell off the business had, unsurprisingly, not been fruitful.

In a commendable show of strength and solidarity the non-unionised workforce organised a blockade of the entrance to the company’s premises from Wednesday the 21 November when they were given notice of the situation.  

The picket was maintained until the 6 December when, after protracted negotiations with the management, the workers were assured that their owed wages would be paid and redundancy payments would be processed by Christmas.

As a result of the collapse and the subsequent attention on their business practices, Reid is now being investigated by the PSNI for breaching child labour laws after it emerged that a 14-year old school boy had worked there for up to five nights a week. Other allegations of misconduct by the company, such as workers having to work 70 hour weeks, are also being examined.

It is suggested that with rising fuel and credit costs many of the smaller operators in the haulage market may not survive the next year. The spiralling cost of oil, due partly to the ongoing occupations in the Middle East and the end of cheap loans resulting from the recent “credit crunch”, are manifestations of the problems inherent in the global capitalist system. This crisis looks set to intensify over the course of the year and the effects will be felt by many working people.

This episode of workers forced into struggle for their rightful entitlement is a great example to other workers who find their jobs, wages and conditions under attack.

All assets owned by this family firm, including property and related interests, (Reid Motorsport is also managed by Liam Reid) should be taken into public ownership by the Assembly so steady employment can be provided for people in the area. But instead of being run by the same incompetent management, it should be democratically run by representatives of the workforce, unions and local community.

Reid Transport's recent collapse has unearthed the exploitation of a 14 year old worker who worked night shifts of up to 11 hours before going to school the next morning!

The worker, who cannot be named, stated he worked mostly from 8pm to midnight, but on some nights he worked until 7am the next day. On some occasions he was working five nights a week!  He kept up this workload while still attending school during the day. This is of course illegal, but as senior barrister Jill Brown recently stated "it does happen quite regularly that children are employed... beyond the hours that they are supposed to be".

This will come as no surprise to many young workers still at school, who are forced into working longer hours just to keep up with higher living costs. In October 2007 the minimum wage for 16-17 year olds increased by 10p an hour to £3.40. This miserly extra 10p means nothing when the prices of everything from food to CDs are rising daily.

Presently school students can legally work two hours on a school day, but cannot work between 7pm and 7am. This is casually ignored by bosses throughout Northern Ireland. Current legislation, supposedly in favour of protecting young workers, actually excludes workers under 16 from entitlement to the minimum wage. This leads to super-exploitation of under 16’s by bosses being allowed to pay starvation wages.

Since 1997 there has only been one successful prosecution of a company for paying under the minimum wage, making bosses feel confident they can get away with this super-exploitation. Socialist Youth and the Socialist Party however, have forced many businesses to increase wages over the years by ‘Naming & Shaming’ low pay bosses and picketing businesses we have discovered are paying peanuts.

However, greedy employers out to make a profit will always seek ways to further exploit young workers. The example of Reid Transport is only the tip of the iceberg. Socialist Youth has spoken to many young workers who get just £2 an hour! It is the nature of capitalism to pay the lowest wage possible to maximise profits. This exploitation will continue until there is a joint struggle of the low paid to fight for better wages and conditions linked to the building of a socialist alternative to the cut-throat system of capitalism.

Are you low paid? Bad conditions at work? Know your rights? Get organised! - Contact Socialist Youth today at 02890232962 or 07876146473

Socialist Youth demands:
- £8 an hour minimum wage
- Scrap the youth exemptions
- Trade union rights for all young workers