Trade unions, workers and campaigners descend on Yves Rocher Paris headquarters to demand end to union busting in Turkey

September 24, 2018

PARIS, 20 September – A delegation visited the global headquarters of Yves Rocher to deliver a petition of over 124,000 signatures calling on the cosmetics industry giant to rehire over 130 employees who were illegally sacked by the group’s Turkish subsidiary Kosan Kozmetik for joining a trade union.

The delegation was made up of workers who had come all the way from Turkey, as well as trade unions IndustriALL Global Union, Petrol-Is and CFDT, and activists from international consumer campaign group SumOfUs, who launched the petition.

Kozan Kozmetic laid off over 132 workers during the spring for having joined a trade union, despite the fact that the right to unionise is recognised both by the Turkish constitution and the internationally recognised conventions of the International Labour Organisation.

In light of the demonstration, a member of staff from the Rocher group agreed to meet with the delegation. At the meeting, lasting almost an hour, the workers and unions explained in detail what the Yves Rocher subsidiary had submitted its workers to, and conveyed the demands from the workers who had been illegally fired.

“It appears that the company directors in Turkey are not sharing all the facts with the Rocher group, and our meeting gave the delegation the opportunity to provide the full details of the situation their workers are facing,” said Kemal Özkan, Assistant General Secretary of IndustriALL Global Union, who travelled from Geneva for the meeting. “We hope that this meeting will result in a genuine social dialogue, which in turn will resolve the dispute. But if Yves Rocher continues to ignore the situation, we will be forced to step up our international campaign.”

“ ‘Reinvent yourself every day’ is Yves Rocher’s slogan. Between that and reinventing workers’ rights there is apparently just one easy step!” said Fatah Sadaoui, Campaign Manager at SumOfUs. “For over five months, the Rocher group kept its eyes shut while Kozan Kozmetik blithely trampled its workers’ fundamental rights. With our partners at IndustriALL, SumOfUs members will keep fighting, until Yves Rocher rehires every one of the workers who were illegally laid off.”

Kozan Kozmetik makes products for the Flomar brand, Turkey’s largest makeup company, in which Yves Rocher has held a 51% stake since 2012.

See the petition:

French: https://actions.sumofus.org/a/yves-rocher-cessez-la-casse-syndicale-en-turquie

English: https://actions.sumofus.org/pages/yves-rocher-stop-union-busting-in-turkey/

Photos and video :

Photos and videos from the demonstration are available here and here.