Click here for all this website's coverage of the Gate Gourmet dispute.

This is an urgent message seeking support for sacked Gate Gourmet workers. Please once you have read it, forward it on to everyone in your in-box. There are 670 sacked workers families' who need financial support and practical solidarity.

Hackney TUC met on Tuesday 6th September and formed a support group for the 670 workers who were sacked by British Airway's catering company, Gate Gourmet. We heard from workers how Gate Gourmet had planned for over a year to dismiss the workers in order to employ agency workers on lower pay and worse terms and conditions.

Gate Gourmet workers earn on average £12,000 producing in-flight meals. This is hardly a living wage in London but the company want to drive down pay even further to increase their profits. Yet, David Bonderman, an American tycoon whose business owns Gate Gourmet is reported to have spent £5.5 million on his 60th birthday party!

We are determined to mobilise support throughout the community for an issue which at its core simply one of social justice. The initiative has been launched by Hackney TUC, but we hope and intend that it will be much broader than our organisation and will encompass every section of Hackney's diverse community.

The support group has been launched in response to the Heathrow catering company, Gate Gourmet's decision to dismiss 670 workers (predominantly Asian women) who had attended a union meeting in response to management's introduction of agency workers at a time they were seeking to make existing employees redundant. Details of the dispute are available on the TGWU website and on the national support group website.

According to an article in the Daily Mirror the company had a carefully prepared and pre-arranged plan to provoke the T&GWU members into 'unofficial action' so that they could dismiss them and replace them with cheaper non-unionised workers.

The workers are predominantly Sikh and Muslim, many with decades of service to the company, which was originally British Airways in-house caterers. All are low paid.

The TGWU members have had messages of support from throughout the trade union movement both here and internationally. However, with Gate Gourmet determined to break the union, it is now urgent that sympathy is turned into solidarity.

This is a classic union-busting exercise which has implications for the whole movement. If Gate Gourmet successfully are allowed to break the union, then other employers will undoubtedly wish to follow their example.

This dispute must be seen as crucially important to the whole of the trade union movement.

Hackney GG support group intends to:

• Raise money for the workers hardship fund.

• Co-ordinate 'bust the busters' activities to protest and demonstrate outside of the premises of companies associated with the parent company (Texas Pacific Group) who own, for example, Burger King and Blue Arrow, who are recruiting agency workers to fill the jobs of the sacked workforce.
• Alert the labour and trade union movement and the community of the impact of this 'American style' union busting on the trade union movement.
• Seek to maximise the number of individuals, trade union branches and community organisations prepared to pledge support for the sacked workers.

Activities already planned include:

• Holding a stall in Mare street (outside the town hall) on Thursday at 12.30pm-1.30pm, to distribute information and to raise donations.

• Attending the demonstration of support at the 'mound' on the perimeter road this Sunday - click for details.
• Attending the support benefit on Sunday 11 September in the evening organised by the Shop Stewards and the Workers Beer Company - click for details.

How you can help.

• Cascade this email to EVERYONE in your in-box, not just labour and trade union activists; this is an issue with widespread support

• If you are not already on Hackney TUC's email distribution list then send us your contact details and we will keep you informed.
• Send a personal message of support.
• Undertake a solidarity collection at work, and send the money to the support fund.
• Can you get a public statement of support from your trade union branch, faith or community organisation?
• We can supply speakers for meetings in the area, including shop stewards representing the workforce.
• Regularly visit the Hackney TUC website for more info.
• If you do not work or live in Hackney and you want to play a role in supporting these workers, then contact the London wide support group.

Please act now.

The workers are members of the Transport and General Workers Union and their General Secretary stated: "the Gate Gourmet workers' case now goes beyond just an industrial dispute.

"They are the focus for the trade union movement and the fight for decency and justice in the workplace. We do not forget that many of our people were sacked with three minutes notice over a public address system and with twenty minutes notice by a megaphone," said Mr. Woodley. "These are decent, hard-working, honourable people who have been treating appallingly. We believe British Airways should do the decent thing and resist the pressure to let Gate Gourmet benefit from their actions but equally BA should be clear the public support for this group of workers is massive and may well affect their business."

An injury to one is an injury to all