bodyType

customContents

entityId

entityUuid

articlePageQuery

filter

article

articleBaseAdvertisingInfoArticle

articleListArticle

articleSeoArticle

hooksArticleAcknowledgementGateOverlayArticle

hooksTrackPageViewArticle

hooksContentInterestArticle

articleLinkingDataContent

hooksAmpRedirectArticle

articleSchemaContent

liveArticle

advertZone

sentiment

contentLock

topics

types

sections

paywallTypes

createdDate

publishedDate

sponsorType

urlAlias

moreOnThisArticles

commentCount

authorLocations

authors

corrections

displaySlideShow

multimediaEmbed

printHeadline

seriesContainer

articleSpeeches

socialHeadline

headline

images

flag

firstTopic

glossary

flattenTypeIds

image

relatedLinks

relatedNewsletters

__typename

sponsor

pdfFiles

seriesReverseOrder

series

disableOffPlatformContent

published

updatedDate

summary

subHeadline

body

keywords

readingTime

customTimezone

liveContents

Mimi Lau

Tensions  between a Honda supplier in Guangdong and its nearly 1,500 workers are rising rapidly as management has spread word it is seeking to recruit amid stagnant  talks after five days of halted production.
Workers at Honda Lock in Zhongshan plan  a mass rally today, saying the plant has been dragging  its feet in solving the labour dispute.  
'The rally will start at 8am, and we're expecting a massive turnout,' one worker said.
Honda Lock's recruitment advertisements were everywhere on the streets of Xiaolan town  yesterday, and workers said they had seen a large recruitment sign  in front of the factory offering monthly salaries as high as 2,000 yuan (HK$2,280). 
Workers said they did not believe the offer was genuine. 
'Even front-line employees with 10 years of experience who work their  [backsides] off on the production line can't even get 2,000,' a 33-year-old worker from Guizhou  said.
'If they could really offer 2,000 yuan, there would be no reason for us to be striking in the first place.'
Several workers  produced their pay slips to show their salaries were  nowhere near 2,000 yuan. 
Two workers said they had heard that the company was ready to sack 10  workers for every 10 new  ones they hired.
Waves of workers began filling the road leading towards the plant after 7.30am yesterday. They refused to step  into the factory  unless management  gave them a satisfactory response to their  demand for a pay rise from 939 yuan  to 1,600 yuan a month. 
After days of deadlocked talks, the workers were offered a pay rise of 100 yuan and  100 yuan for staff welfare on top of their basic monthly salaries. They were told to get back to work or else they would be treated as absent and faced being sacked. 
The tactic proved  ineffective, as the workers walked away  from the offer at around 9am, saying  it was unacceptable.
Yesterday's offer was just the latest  attempt to lure the workers back to work. Others have included locking workers inside the plant, during the first two days of the strike, and forcing them to sign an agreement to accept a 100-yuan pay rise or resign, on the third day. Workers stomped away from the plant and were involved in a stand-off with riot police for nearly two hours on Friday. 
The workers were supposed to have three days off from today for the Dragon Boat Festival, but the factory asked them to work extra instead. 
Workers said the strike  was likely to continue. 
Xinhua and other state media cited  people yesterday  as saying senior executives of Honda, Japan's second-largest carmaker, would arrive in Zhongshan to negotiate with the workers. 
Reports said the company  threatened to sack workers if they continued their walkout beyond tomorrow.  
Xinhua also reported on Saturday that the ongoing strike  might have an impact on half  of Honda's car assembly lines.  A Beijing-based  spokesman for the firm, Takayuki Fuji,  denied the report and said strikes had ended on Saturday and production had resumed. 
At least three workers said yesterday  they had  heard that managers and supervisors  had restarted machines in the empty workshops. 
They said they were told this by about 20 new workers whom Honda Lock had hired just before the strike on Wednesday and who did not take part in the  industrial action as they had not yet passed probation. 
'Those couple of managers started machines on their own, pretending production was back on. That's too funny,' said the  worker from Guizhou. 'Some of the machines were switched on and newly hired workers were told to operate them so people outside could hear the machinery noise, thinking production was back on.
'They think the workers waiting outside are all a bunch of three-year-olds.'
Amid the dispute, Guangdong Communist Party chief Wang Yang called a teleconference, highlighting the importance of 'maintaining harmonious labour relations', the Nanfang Daily reported yesterday. 
Wang was quoted as saying  the province would set up a mechanism to handle disputes as soon as possible. Government officials were urged to respect the legal rights of labour and management when serving as mediators. Wang  also urged them to set up functioning  unions that would serve as  genuine workers' representatives, standing up for them in their fight for better rights.
Workers at the Honda  vehicle parts factory in the Nanhai district  of Foshan     clashed with government-backed trade union staff  after employees would not be persuaded to return to work on May 31.
Wang also stressed that overturning the current economic development model, which relied on workers clocking in for extra shifts and  earning low wages, was important. 
The first round of industrial action to hit Honda's operations ended last Friday when workers at the Honda Auto Parts Manufacturing in Foshan returned to work after a two-week strike. The shutdown  caused such a shortage of parts that Honda had to close four car factories in Guangzhou and Wuhan, Hubei . Management agreed to increase the basic monthly salaries of workers by about 500 yuan.  
The success of that strike prompted about 250 workers at Foshan Fengfu Autoparts, a factory in Guangdong that supplies parts for exhausts,  to walk off the job last Monday, demanding better wages and double pay for overtime.



Honda looking to recruit as strike drags on