The CCOO union denounces the fact that 40% of Ilunion employees at the El Prat factory, the largest company in Spain, are on leave due to difficult working conditions.
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Rubén, 27 years old, does not go below 20 kilometers per day. He spends the day up and down the Amazon logistics center in Prat de Llobregat, Barcelona, dragging pallets with piles of empty boxes. “It’s very hard, and the day you go a little slow for one reason or another, they scold you,” he says.
Suffering from an intellectual disability of 38%, this young man is one of the 125 employees who work at the Special Employment Center (CEE) Ilunion, within the Amazon warehouse in Barcelona, the largest in Spain. the multinational. Grouped around the CCOO union, they demonstrated this Wednesday at the gates of the establishment to demand more breaks and compliance with the law on the prevention of occupational risks.
The union estimates that up to 40% of the workforce is on sick leave due to work overload. Furthermore, the Labor Inspectorate has opened a sanction procedure against Ilunion considering that it does not comply with labor regulations, which require those who hire disabled people to individually assess the risks of their work.
The company, which did not wish to carry out evaluations, appealed the inspection report. Amazon also refused to respond to elDiario.es.
Image of the Amazon center of El Prat de Llobregat (Barcelona). EFE/Alejandro García
The origin of the labor conflict dates back to the end of 2022, when Amazon decided to subcontract to Ilunion the part of the logistical tasks which consists of moving pallets loaded with packages inside its warehouse. It was then that the work was entrusted to employees of the Ilunion Special Employment Center, who then only carried out recycling work.
“Many colleagues don’t even last a month”
Known as tote runnersthese workers are dedicated to moving piles of empty boxes eight hours a day, 40 hours a week. There are generally 48 plastic crates per pallet, or around 100 kilos in total if you count the transport trolley. “You end up with ruined feet,” says Rubén. “Many new colleagues barely last a month, or even a few days before leaving, I didn’t expect to last that long,” he adds.
“We have workers on sick leave due to physical problems, mental fatigue… It’s total exploitation,” lamented José Antonio Ramírez, president of the Ilunion works council, during the gathering which brought together around fifty of people.
One of those who had to take sick leave is Damián, also 27 years old, suffering from pain in his lower back and waist. “The pace is very hard and if you go down a little, you already have the boss complaining about the walkie talkie“, he explains. “They don’t care if you have a disability, they even told me that people don’t want to work because they are too lazy,” he exclaims.
This young man, who also describes walking “more than 20 kilometers a day,” explains that he injured himself from pushing the load so much with his legs. “Since I don’t have any strength in my arms, sometimes I help myself with my legs and in the end I ended up hurting myself,” he explains.
We have workers on sick leave due to physical problems, mental fatigue… It’s total exploitation
Those who can testify to the exhaustion of this work are precisely the able-bodied personnel hired by Amazon, who carried out the tasks of tote runner before they are outsourced. In fact, one of their challenges was increasing the rotation so that no one was carrying pallets for an entire day.
“They are moving the material that we transported, but at a lower price,” explains Emilio Rodríguez, Amazon worker and CGT liaison officer. After two years of these outsourced tasks, he adds, they are now assigned about two hours per work day. tote runners “Because those of Ilunion have too many casualties and cannot cope.”
Exterior image of the Amazon logistics center in El Prat de Llobregat
Between inspection and negotiation
Ilunion employees demand that the company applies the logistics employment contract to them from the start, instead of the cleaning contract, which is the one they currently have. Their salary currently fluctuates around the inter-professional minimum wage, whereas with a salary in the logistics sector, which they consider to be the one to which they are entitled by type of work, they would have an increase of 400 or 500 euros per month in their payroll.
But the list of complaints does not end there. “We asked for more time off,” notes Ramírez. If necessary, they ask that more staff be hired so that there is greater turnover and that, for example, instead of eight hours a day acting as tote runnersit could be five or six.
At the negotiating table, CCOO knows that it currently has the Labor Inspectorate on its side, which confirmed in a report a few months ago the non-compliance with at least two articles of the labor regulations. work. On the one hand, because Ilunion did not use the correct method to carry out the risk assessment linked to the transport of these pallets. And, on the other hand, because it has not assessed these risks nor adapted them to the physical or mental disability of these employees, as required by the current royal decree on the prevention of occupational risks.
“You have to evaluate your tasks individually, one disability is not the same as another, the company must comply with what the law says and not do business to the detriment of workers who already have enough difficulties in the company,” says Carlos del Barrio, CCOO Habitat sector manager.
During the rally, cries like “walk less, get paid more” are heard, while one of them blurts out: “We do a marathon every day!” Rubén, smiling, assures that in his case it is not an exaggeration. His mileage record could come close, he says. “We are not saying that we cannot carry out difficult tasks, but that at least we are given a little rest, even if it is five minutes every hour,” he comments.
