First trade union formed at Lidl supermarket

In September 2006, the first trade union organisation was established at the Lidl supermarket chain. The circumstances surrounding this event were somewhat unusual, involving a night-time staff assembly held in the car park of a Lidl outlet. The employees state that they took the step of establishing a union in order to counteract recurrent violations of their rights by the directors of Lidl Polska.

Poor working conditions alleged

The Lidl supermarket network in Poland, Lidl Polska, comprises some 200 retail outlets employing approximately 5,000 people. Increasingly, Lidl employees have been complaining about poor working conditions, alleging problems such as poor work organisation, staffing shortages or unpaid overtime work. Some staff actually compared the present situation at Lidl with events at Biedronka, another supermarket chain, which has received extensive news coverage on account of widespread abuse of employee rights, brought to light in a well-publicised court case by an aggrieved worker.

Plan to establish trade union

Poor working conditions and abuse of their rights persuaded Lidl employees in Gorzów Wielkopolski, a town in western Poland, to establish a trade union. Having consulted with local activists from the Independent and Self-Governing Trade Union Solidarity (Niezalezny Samorzadny Zwiazek Zawodowy ‘Solidarnosc’, NSZZ Solidarnosc), the initiators of the trade union plan called a meeting of prospective union members, to be held after the end of the working day in the car park outside one of the city’s Lidl stores. From there, the employees were to proceed to the NSZZ Solidarnosc offices for the full founding meeting.

At the agreed date and time, Magdalena Zawislak, manager of one of Gorzów Wielkopolski’s Lidl outlets and an organiser of the union project, stepped out into the car park and encountered not her fellow employees, but representatives of Lidl’s board of directors. At the same time, security guards prevented the other employees from leaving the supermarket building.

Company opposition to plan

Taken together, this amounted to a clear indication that the company does not welcome the setting up of a trade union within the Lidl chain. The representatives of the board of directors present at the scene tried to win Ms Zawislak, and the employees confined within the building, over to their point of view. They might have been successful in their attempts were it not for the appearance of NSZZ Solidarnosc members, who had been contacted by one of the supermarket workers being held inside the building.

Support from NSZZ Solidarnosc

The arrival of trade union activists emboldened the Lidl employees, who brushed aside the threats of the security guards and made their way out of the store building and then moved to the NSZZ Solidarnosc offices. The founding meeting proceeded without further incident, with almost all the employees of the two Lidl stores in question (38 out of 40 people) joining the newly-established trade union.

Among its first tasks, the union plans to request that Lidl provide information concerning working conditions, remuneration and other issues, such as operation of the in-house social benefits fund and working time rules. The Gorzów Wielkopolski section of NSZZ Solidarnosc, meanwhile, has notified the public prosecution authorities and the National Labour Inspectorate (Panstwowa Inspekcja Pracy, PIP) of the negotiation methods used by the directors of Lidl Polska.

Rafal Towalski, Institute of Public Affairs (ISP)