While the season of good will to all men and peace on earth covers the country, a small part of Hereford has been missed. The ASDA store at Hereford, like all the other ASDA stores, invited their employees to have a ‘free’ Christmas meal. However, in the Hereford store, they forgot to tell the store workers that it would cost them an hour’s pay.

Kevin Clark, GMB Organiser, responsible for the many GMB members at Asda in Hereford commented, “At a time of year when most big companies offer Christmas meals and parties to their hard working staff free of charge, ASDA, who is part of the global Wal-Mart organisation, has been blessed with the Spirit of Scrooge.  Not only did they offer a meal and label it as free, but then deducted an hour’s pay from those who attended so it is hardly free, is it? It is disappointing that companies as large as ASDA can spend as much money as they have on their TV add campaigns, but take an hour’s pay from the store workers.

He added, “It would appear that the only store not to tell those attending the meal about the deduction was Hereford, and we will be supporting our members in their claim to get the money back. The GMB is recognised by ASDA, but they are currently restricting the GMB on talking to its members, hardly an employer of choice.”