Workers at trucking company XPO Logistics went on strike early Thursday morning over what they say are unfair labor practices.
About 100 employees work out of the North Haven warehouse, which mostly serves Sikorsky Aircraft. Union workers said charges have been filed with the National Labor Relations Board alleging wrongful termination and unfair wages, as well as harassment and retaliation for organizing.
“They’re asking for the company to treat them fairly,” said Ashley Latimer, a spokeswoman for the Teamsters. “They’re asking for the company to stop breaking the law, which is why we’re out here. XPO’s breaking federal law by having anti-union practices and we want them to treat the workers with respect. We want them to give them the pay that they deserve. We want them to treat them as people and not as disposable machines.”
Latimer said XPO workers at other sites around the U.S. also started a day of protests Thursday to sound the alarm about their allegations that workers’ rights have been violated.
XPO, which is headquartered in Greenwich, Connecticut, is one of the largest transportation and logistics companies in the world with about 100,000 employees globally.
The company disputes the union's claims.
In a statement XPO said "The facility is operating as normal. We respect the Teamsters’ right to demonstrate. However, our US employees have overwhelmingly rejected unions."
“We’re proud of the work we do in North Haven. We’ve increased wages on average 30% over the last two years, promoted 10 of our colleagues to supervisory or management positions and increased the team by 20% since 2018.”
“Creating a supportive workplace is one of our highest priorities. Our goal is to continually reinforce a workplace culture based on our values: safe, respectful, entrepreneurial, inclusive, and innovative."
The day of action ramps up the Teamsters dispute with XPO. Earlier this month, the union lobbied shareholders at the company's annual meeting, urging them to vote for an independent board chair to shake up corporate governance at XPO. The proposal was rejected by a majority of the company's shareholders.
