Supermarket settlement wins union approval

Mediation between supermarket giant Progressive Enterprises and the National Distribution Union has achieved a settlement for 4200 in-store supermarket workers.

The agreement, reached yesterday after two days of mediation last week failed, would be recommended to union members, NDU national secretary Laila Harre said.

However, more than 500 distribution workers remain locked out of Progressive's chains, including Woolworths, Countdown and Foodtown, three weeks after first walking off the job to protest for pay parity.

Ms Harre said it was pleasing to have reached terms of settlement over the bargaining of a national collective agreement for the supermarket retail workers.

The terms of settlement would be presented to union members for ratification at meetings starting this month and it was "up to them" whether they would accept them or not.

It had taken several months of negotiation on behalf of the retail arm of Progressive's staff to get to this point.

Details of the settlement would not be released until they had been presented to members.

Meanwhile more than 500 of Progressive's distribution workers thumbed their collective noses at an offer made by the company earlier this week.

Progressive sent its latest wage offer, of a 3.5 per cent increase, directly to its workers, bypassing the unions.

Ms Harre said this was an effort to undermine collective bargaining but Progressive managing director Marty Hamnett said the move was allowed under the terms of bargaining arranged at the outset of the dispute.

The workers were locked out three days after beginning what was meant to be a 48-hour strike and the situation quickly became a stalemate.

- NZPA