After being so disgracefully treated when Quebecor World at Corby closed its doors, Quebecor staff have teamed up with Unite, Corby Council and Phil Hope MP to set up a taskforce to help fight for money for retraining, not only for Quebecor staff but also other workers in the Corby area who have lost their jobs recently.
The taskforce wants a package of help including money to pay for training to get as many workers back into local employment as possible.
If the bid is successful, Jobcentre Plus staff would be able to go out to the affected companies to give staff practical help and allow them to access emergency cash to pay for training.
Corby Council chief executive Chris Mallender was spurred to request the rapid response package after 1,000 jobs came under threat in Corby last month and after Unite officials and worker from the plant lobbied Phil Hope MP to step in and get things moving.
Besides the jobs lost at Quebecor, 184 jobs are set to go when Avon moves its call centre to India. In July some jobs will go when coupon processing company Valassis moves some of its operation to Eastern Europe.
Martin Reuby, FOC at Unite union chapel at Quebecor, said: "We are trying to get this taskforce to follow the same model as the Rover taskforce that helped the 5,000 workers made redundant at Longbridge. The job centre has been brilliant but we keep hearing that people cannot apply for help with training from them because they haven't been unemployed for six months.The rapid response package will help bypass that.
"We still have a lot of people who may have no choice but to leave the town – a lot of these people are skilled workers aged between 45 and 55 who will find it difficult unless they get training.
"Some of the workers are still shell-shocked, so we held a meeting at Corby Trades and Labour Club on Sunday to ensure we still keep our comradeship and to disband our old union chapels and form a new unemployed workers chapel."
The Government's rapid response service set up in 2002 seeks to limit the damage of redundancy by offering job seekers an enhanced range of options not normally available.
On Thursday I attended the Unite Wales GPM Sector Conference in Cardiff.
We had a good turnout - with reps from print, papermaking, newspaper and metal packaging companies.
The meeting discussed the BPIF pay deal, organising, Information & Consultation, the Corrugated packaging sector agreement Unite's international work and the problems of agency and temporary workers and why we need legilslation to provide equal treatment.
One of the stories I heard of was of a group of agency workers (not in print) who were hired from an agency for a night-shift - only to be told they were not needed, after they had travelled to work by train and the last train had gone. This sort of crass treatment brings home the need for the Government to legislate as they promised.