Serious safety concerns resulted in a walk-off of hundreds of workers at Woolworths Hume Distribution Centre in the northern Melbourne suburb of Broadmeadows on 11 January. The issue arose after a fire had ignited at a neighbouring tyre-recycling facility.

The fire, from which a thick cover of smoke ascended and drifted across the industrial region, started shortly before 9am. By 12:30pm a change in wind direction forced toxic fumes from the stockpile of 150,000 disused rubber tyres into the distribution centre.

In response to the health and safety hazard, workers departed the workplace after a swift response from union delegates and health and safety representatives in the warehouse. To deal with the sickening fumes laden with toxic chemicals, management offered flimsy paper masks to the workers.

After pointing out that firefighters working down the road to control the fire were wearing full breathing apparatus, the warehouse workers declined management’s offer, and headed off site instead.

More than 100 firefighters were needed to contain the blaze, at a time when the firefighters and the United Firefighters Union are in a pitched battle over safe working conditions with the Victorian Andrews Labor government.

The warehouse workers, members of the National Union of Workers, supply more than 200 supermarkets across Melbourne and regional Victoria.

Recognised as a militant union site because the NUW members there have secured the highest wages across the Woolworths supply chain and some of the best conditions in the logistics industry, the latest action commences an uncertain year for the distribution centre.

Workers there face the prospect of widespread redundancies as the company prepares to scale down production at its facility in Broadmeadows, a suburb already decimated by job losses and factory closures.

As was reported in Red Flag last June, Woolworths has announced that its major Victorian distribution centre will cease operation by 2018 and be replaced by a new, largely automated warehouse in Lyndhurst, located in the south-eastern suburbs of Melbourne.