So we were alarmed when residents, current workers and former workers at Norseland, the company that owns Ilchester cheese, contacted us about what it is like working at the company. Norseland's UK manufacturing base in in Ilchester, Somerset. Here is the Norseland UK "About" page.
Norseland is not UK-owned. It is not owned by Somerset people. Ultimately, Norseland is Norwegian-owned, and owns a large number of cheese brands including Jarlsberg, Snofrisk, Gudbrandsdalen, Applewood and Mexicana cheeses. TINE SA is the owner and is "Norway's largest co-operative of farmers". Norseland has told us that "Norseland is an operating subsidiary of Tine SA as part of the Tine International".
So while Ilchester cheese carries the Ilchester name, and it is produced in Ilchester, the owners are Norwegian.
However, Norseland's Clive Richer Head of Human Resources (HR) and Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) told us:
"whilst Norwegian owned, with a Norwegian CEO, Norseland runs very independently, and recruits 90%+ of its staff from the Somerset/Dorset Area (Being only 6 miles from the Dorset Border), and this will continue to be the case ongoing."
The contact with us from workers followed articles appearing in local media, including with SomersetLive (Reach/Trinity Mirror), where various claims were made by Norseland in a barely-concerned advert for the foreign-owned company, but also in the article Norseland were blaming Brexit for their recruitment and retention problems.
These workers were incensed at the claims made, and refuted the claims made by Norseland.
During the course of 2021, Brexit has been blamed for many things - sometimes this is justified with evidence and sometimes this is not justified by evidence.
So we contacted the Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) Manager mentioned in one of the article, Mr Clive Richer, to ask him some questions.
The letter from the Leader of Somerset Independent, Andrew Pope, is below, along with the responses from Mr Richer.
We will let you make up your own minds about whether he answered our questions, and whether his claims stack up under scrutiny.
We suggest that the claims from Clive Richer do not stand up to much scrutiny.
It also took Mr Richer over two months to reply, and we had to chase him for a response.
We will be going back to the people who made the allegations with Mr Richer's responses.
We will also be asking the unions about Norseland, including what the unions did to help workers, what they did not do to help workers, and why there is no union recognised by Norseland for collective bargaining purposes.
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Letter from Somerset Independents to Norseland's Clive Richer
Good Morning Mr Richer,
Somerset Independents is a pressure group that was formed by residents
to stand up for Somerset residents and their rights.
We support business and the promotion of Somerset. Some of your
cheeses have the names of well-known places in Somerset.
So we were alarmed to note some of the claims made by you in the
following articles:
https://www.somersetlive.co.uk
https://www.business-live.co.u
https://www.somersetlive.co.uk
You stated in the articles that Norseland is a "respected employer
locally; we offer training, good benefits and a career path for
workers". We also note your "Modern Slavery Statement".
Former workers have contacted Somerset Independents to tell us that at
least some of the claims that you made in that article are of
questionable veracity.
They've told us that the recruitment and retention problems faced by
Norseland are nothing to do with Brexit.
These former workers who are residents of Somerset, plus other
residents of Somerset too, have alleged that:
1. Norseland has thrown innocent people out of work
2. The problems are not to do with Brexit, but with the situation at Norseland
3. Norseland inflicts bad treatment on its workers
4. There are health and safety problems at Norseland
5. The pay at Norseland is poor
6. There is poor management and poor leadership
7. Problems are not sorted out
Q1. How do you respond to the above allegations?
Q2. What changes have been made in the management and structure of
Norseland recently, and do you believe these have had an impact on
recruitment and retention?
Q3. Why does Norseland seek to blame Brexit when it appears from these
allegations from your own former workers, that it is the way your
company is being run that is the problem and not Brexit?
Q4. When you claim in one article that, and I quote:
"So many of our staff returned to their home countries when Brexit
happened, and we have faced a struggle to recruit replacements because
of the general exodus of EU workers across the county and the UK as a
whole. "
It isn't true, is it? Because these workers have found better work for
better pay elsewhere after leaving Norseland, some of them within a
matter days.
Q5. Because of their unhappiness, we've been informed that workers
joined the GMB union, which they are entitled to do under the law. Is
there a union recognised by Norseland for collective bargaining
purposes? Which union is it?
Please give these questions your earliest attention. We offer you a
right of reply.
Regards,
Andrew Pope
Leader
Somerset Independents
Responses To Questions from Clive Richer to Andrew Pope
Q1. How do you respond to the above allegations?
In response to this question, we believe at Norseland that we treat all our staff with fairness and respect. The business has a number of company policies and procedures in place to ensure that everyone is treated equally. In terms of people leaving, we have conducted confidential exit interviews which demonstrate that a number of staff have left to return home.
Regarding Health and Safety, Norseland takes this very seriously and as such monitors our near misses and loss time accidents etc and compares these to industry standards set out by the HSE. On all measures, we are performing better than the standards set. These are achieved by all our employees following the thorough processes and procedures in place.
In terms of pay, Norseland’s starting rate is £10.00ph and goes up to £10.65 (Food Processor rates) and this does not include Shift premiums available for certain shifts, with an additional £2.08ph. We believe these are competitive within our area.
We cannot comment on specific incidents involving past employees. On the question about “Poor Management, Poor Leadership and problems not being addressed”. What we can say is that we also closely observe our retention and absence as a business and our figures are in line with national CIPD averages for our industry. It is always regrettable when people leave our business because they are unhappy, and as a responsible employer, we always try and learn from those experiences to provide a better working relationship with new and existing employees going forward.
Q2. What changes have been made in the management and structure of Norseland recently, and do you believe these have had an impact on recruitment and retention?
We have had management changes over the last 18 months, however we do not believe these have had a negative impact, to the contrary our retention figures has significantly improved over the last 2 years.
Q3. Why does Norseland seek to blame Brexit when it appears from these allegations from your own former workers, that it is the way your company is being run that is the problem and not Brexit?
As previously mentioned, a number of our staff have left to return home.
Q4. When you claim in one article that, and I quote:
"So many of our staff returned to their home countries when Brexit happened, and we have faced a struggle to recruit replacements because of the general exodus of EU workers across the county and the UK as a whole. "
It isn't true, is it? Because these workers have found better work for better pay elsewhere after leaving Norseland, some of them within a matter days.
In response to Q4: Some of our staff have left due to Brexit. Clearly there will always be other staff who move on to other businesses for a variety of reasons of which pay will no doubt be one of them.
Q5. Because of their unhappiness, we've been informed that workers joined the GMB union, which they are entitled to do under the law. Is there a union recognised by Norseland for collective bargaining purposes? Which union is it?
In response to Q5: Norseland does not currently have a recognised Union.
| Clive Richer |
| Head of HR & CSR |
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