Meat works CEO meets with anxious workers

The severely-damaged Silver Fern meat works. Photo / Herald on Sunday

The mood among around 200 workers who have been left jobless after a massive fire gutted a Waikato freezing works at the weekend remains cautiously optimistic after a meeting with the company's CEO this morning.

Keith Cooper offered the workers from the Silver Fern Farms plant, one of the Te Aroha area's major employers, a week's full pay and two weeks' minimum pay in the leadup to Christmas. 190 positions have been offered at a plant in Hawke's Bay, leaving some workers worried they may have to leave town to provide for their families.

Mr Cooper said the company was still discussing whether the plant will be rebuilt with insurance assessors.

Yesterday, Waikato district fire safety officer Kevin Holmes told the Herald the cause of the fire was sparks from a saw being used by a contractor to cut through exterior cladding to install a condenser on Friday afternoon.

Mr Holmes said that behind the exterior cladding was a sandwich board which had a tin exterior and a polystyrene interior.

"It appears that the saw generated some sparks which began smouldering in the polystyrene ... it would have been festering away within the wall panel for quite some time," he said.

Firefighters were called to the blaze about 11.30pm Friday night

Matamata Piako mayor Hugh Vercoe said the plant had the necessary resource consents to be rebuilt, and a willing workforce.

But there would be "downtime" in getting the project finished, affecting not only the families concerned but the local economy.

"It will be enormously disruptive for the families of Te Aroha but it is a very resilient community and they will come together to deal with it the best they can."

An employee at the plant, who asked not to be named, said the fire was a "real kick in the guts" for the staff and their families.

The man has worked at the plant for more than 10 years and said he would not be affected by the possibility of having to move to another of the Silver Fern Farms plants, in Dargaville or Hastings, to work.

"But the average age here is guys of about 28 and most of them have kids so it wouldn't be that easy for them," he said.

He did not know what would be discussed at today's meeting but was confident the plant would be rebuilt.

"What happens in the meantime is what we are worried about."