Camped in front of the door of the closed restaurant, the Découverte employees distribute leaflets to explain to their colleagues from other Techn’hom companies why they are striking : October 20, they will have to find another place to eat. Elior officially announced on Monday that the restaurant would close its doors permanently on October 20.
Maxime, employee at General Electric comes 2 to 3 times a week: “Frankly I’m really surprised. If there’s no Discovery, it’ll either be the GE sandwich shop or I’ll have to bring my meals.” “We are going to lose 50% of the collective catering offer at Techn’homcontinues Eddy Cardot, CGT delegate at Alstom, came to support the employees of the restaurant. There are still the Comptoirs de l’Etang but it is further away. It will reduce the break time.
“And still, we can find a solution, tempers Maxime, but it is for the employees that it is the hardest. It’s a _sudden and brutal decision_.”
It’s inhuman – Isabelle, employee of the Découverte for 15 years
Indeed, the nine employees do not understand. “They can’t tell us a month before closing without knowing what they’re going to do with us. It’s inhumane, says Isabelle, an employee at La Découverte for 15 years. We all have loans, we are of a certain age, we will not be able to find work like that. They talk about a closure for economic reasons but they tell us that they don’t want to lay us off so _we don’t know what will become of us._“
“At the moment we don’t have _no response from management_“, adds Angélique Novelin, in office for 30 years, who specifies that 5 employees have already been made redundant last year.
Footfall is falling and costs are rising – Elior
Joined by France Bleu, the communication department ofElior explains that the company lose a lot of money for several years on the Découverte site. She invokes the drop in attendance linked to the Covid and the costs which have increased, energy costs, cost of food raw materials, revaluation of catering wages. But she returns the ball to the AURIE, the Association of Users of the Inter-Company Restaurant. This non-profit organization orchestrates collective catering on the Techn’hom site. Elior claims to have alerted AURIE to its difficulties in January. The group believes that the association should have anticipated and launched a call for tenders (note: when a company takes over a collective restaurant, it is customary for it to take over the employees with it).
A bad faith argument
But for the AURIE it is a bad faith argument : “Indeed, Elior had told us to have difficulties on the site but today all company restaurants are experiencing these difficulties.Explain Emilie Tenkéré, secretary of the AURIE office. The official letter telling us that they intended to terminate the contract is dated June 27. It takes six months to launch a tender. It was impossible. They offered to revise the prices upwards but it was getting way too expensive for a company catering. They also asked us to support them financially, but an association like ours does not have the means. It is up to them to assume the future of employees. They are employees of Elior. _Given the delay, unfortunately we can not do anything_.“
The AURIE will now reflect on a new offer for the Techn’hom but it will take time.
The employees, on the other hand, have see you this tuesday with their leadership. In the meantime, they have decided to return to work. They will then discuss the follow-up to be given to the movement.