Workers vote ‘yes’ in the referendum despite warning that Spain will stop producing primary aluminum in the midst of a raw material crisis
Alcoa workers in San Cibrao (Cervo, Lugo) approved the agreement at the last minute on Tuesday to end the production of primary aluminum at the plant for the next two years, until 2024,
The results of the vote, released by the works council early in the morning of this Wednesday, place the support for yes among the workforce at 69.68%, whose participation reached 76%, of 1,063 registered workers. Thus, out of a total of 808 votes cast, the count yielded 563 votes in favor (that 69.68%), 196 votes against (24.26%), 40 blank votes (4.95%) and nine invalid votes (1.11%).
Meanwhile, the result of the referendum in the contractor companies was unfavorable for the agreement, with 180 votes cast: 54 in favor (30%), 105 against (58.3%) and 21 blank (11.7%).
Therefore, the committee approves the agreement to start the cessation of production, a proposal to solve the conflict for which, it warns, “jobs and continuity continue to be threatened” at the aluminum plant.
In fact, the president of the Alcoa works council in Cervo (Lugo), José Antonio Zan, warned this Wednesday that the workforce will go through “the worst moments of their working life” in the next two years, due to the termination of employment. production, a decision that he understands since the workers opted, in his opinion, for the “less bad” option.
“There were two solutions and the staff understood that one was the least bad,” Zan stressed in statements to journalists this Wednesday, after knowing the results of the vote. In this regard, he has found that “no one put on the table a solution that would give viability” for the years 2022 and 2023.
“If it had covered a small need so that at least those 200 vats could have been maintained, it would have been different. A drop in production is not the same as a cessation of activity, “he had an impact.
In this sense, he has warned of the “real hecatomb” that means for Spain that between 2022 and 2024, “at least”, the country will not produce primary aluminum. For this reason, in his opinion, «the rulers should explain how it can be that in the midst of a crisis in raw materials, Spain stops producing a material so necessary not only for the ecological transition, but also for elementary sectors such as pharmaceuticals, automobiles or feeding”.
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