ASDA’s meat deal

ASDA supermarket and Unite general union have together launched an agreement that leads the way for other supermarkets in Unite’s long-running campaign to make meat industry employment fairer (see Workplace Report, July 2009, p. 3). Central to the initiative is a deal to pay agency workers at the same rate as directly employed staff, to reduce the use of agency workers and to end unacceptable practices of unfair treatment, often of migrant workers, which the union argues are also socially divisive in communities. Asda’s move came ahead of publication this month of the EHRC equality body’s enquiry on employment practices in the meat industry.