The management of ATA, Israel’s largest textile manufacturing plant, reversed itself last night and rejected Premier David Ben Gurion as an arbitrator of the 11-week-old strike of its 1, 700 employees.
The management’s action came after Mr. Ben Gurion had openly committed himself to the Haifa Labor Council on two major points at issue in the dispute. He pledged that he would recommend fulfillment of Labor Minister Mordecai Namir’s earlier proposals which generally favor the workers and that he would recommend adherence by ATA to the dismissal patterns established in national Histadrut-industry contracts. This point, too, favored the workers.
When ATA management objected to Mr. Ben Gurion’s action, he gave it the choice of withdrawing its earlier consent to his serving as arbitrator. When ATA reversed itself, the Premier announced that henceforth he would not involve himself further in the entire situation. This effectively threw the strike situation back into its long deadlock.
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