Council staff prepare to ballot for strike

Anton McNulty

THE outdoor staff of Mayo County Council are expected to ballot for strike next week after two of their colleagues were involuntarily transferred from their base in Westport to Ballinrobe.
An official from the SIPTU trade union, which represents close to 250 outdoor workers in Mayo County Council, confirmed to The Mayo News that they are preparing their members to ballot for industrial action which will include a strike.
The transfer of two workers from the Westport depot to Ballinrobe against their consent caused uproar among the workforce leading to the threatened strike action.
Anthony McCormack, an official with SIPTU explained that the worker’s shop stewards met last week and it was agreed to ballot the workers for strike action.
The ballot was likely to take place next Monday when Peter Hynes, the Chief Executive of Mayo County Council is due to give councillors an up-to-date report on the situation at the Council’s budget meeting.
The matter of the workers transfer was raised at last week’s monthly meeting of Mayo County Council when councillors voiced their concern at the developments and called on the Council Executive to reverse their decision to transfer the workers.
They asked Mr Hynes to deal with the matter before Monday’s budget meeting and Independent councillor Michael Kilcoyne told The Mayo News that members expect the matter to be resolved by then.
“The members were very clear at last week’s meeting on what they want done and that is to have the matter resolved,” he said.
Mr McCormack said the union had hoped the matter would have been resolved in the Workplace Relations Commission but claimed the Council’s decision to go ahead with the transfers prevented this and accelerated industrial action.

Council staff prepare to ballot for strike