Disgusted and upset. It is under a tent, sheltered from the rain, that about sixty employees of the Buitoni factory in Caudry, in the North, learned, this Thursday morning, of the definitive closure of the site. The announcement by a shop steward was brief. “The managers are looking for a buyer. The only certainty: the maintenance of salary until the end of the year, ”explains Madjid Bouala, facing a dumbfounded assembly.
A few tears, but above all, a lot of anger. “We have our whole life and our family here, what will become of us? “, worries Sophie *, thirty years of boxing and the physical fatigue that goes with it. Earlier, the leaders of the global agribusiness giant, Nestlé, owner of Buitoni, had been greeted by boos and the dumping in front of the factory of a pile of manure.
“Nestlé has been talking to us for thirteen months”
Since the beginning of March and the suspension of activity, this decision was expected. It was therefore confirmed, shortly before 10 a.m. End of an interminable wait, with, in the background, the black smoke given off by burnt tires. The only heat that emanated from this disastrous morning for the last 113 employees of the SPAC (Food Production Company of Caudry), official name of the Buitoni factory.
“Nestlé has been talking to us for thirteen months, denounces Didier *, an employee for ten years. We want the group to take responsibility and tell the whole of France that we, as employees, are not responsible for the contamination with the bacteria ”. This E. Coli bacterium is indeed the starting point, a year ago, of the troubles of this factory: two children died and dozens of others poisoned after eating frozen pizzas suspected of having been made in Caudry.
An investigation has been opened for homicides and involuntary injuries. But the investigation is long, so suspicions are running high with a hypothesis that some workers openly mention. “The separation that existed between the two production lines has been removed,” explains one of them. Unsuitable flour could end up on the wrong production line. But it’s a management decision. And today, we’re the ones paying for it. »
“We are not responsible”
The mayor of Caudry, Frédéric Bricout, does not hesitate either to question “Nestlé’s strategic decision to abandon thermal flour which kills certain germs with conventional flour”. “They took a significant risk by doing that,” said the elected official. “If they changed things that facilitated contamination, it was them [Nestlé]. We are not responsible”, adds, for his part, Stéphane Derammelaere, Force Ouvrière delegate, at the end of the meeting.
Today, Nestlé justifies the closure of the site by the fall in sales of its frozen pizzas. A double penalty for employees who, for several months, have suffered the wrath of public opinion. “We were asked to keep quiet on the subject, notes Alain*. We even had to put up with reports questioning the hygiene of the factory, when the company could easily have denied all that. He too has the impression that the scenario was, in any case, written in advance.
“Since the arrival of Nestlé, personnel management has changed,” testifies Nathalie*. After 35 years in the company, she learned of her end-of-career leave (CFC) by text message in early January. “In view of the counters that you have yet to take, you will finish tomorrow at the end of your shift,” wrote the Director of Human Resources to him. “Leaving like that is terrible! “, she laments. About forty employees were thus thanked by a CFC.
“It’s a huge mess”
At the age of 51, Valérie will quite simply be laid off in economics. “After telling us that we were production machines, we discover that Nestlé is a grinding machine,” she sighs. “This company operated like a family with close-knit workers and our managers did not like that. It’s a huge mess, ”she insists.
Fifty kilometers away, the French bakery manufacturer Cérélia, one of the main players in the sector in Europe, inaugurated a new site a few weeks ago in Saint-Laurent-Blangy, near Arras, in the Pas -de-Calais. It is, according to the group, “the largest European pizza and pie dough factory”. It should enable the creation of 185 jobs.