NOT everything is extra-smooth after the £7.8 billion sale of Tadcaster brewer Scottish & Newcastle (S & N) to European giants Heineken and Carlsberg.
A row has broken out over pensions in the wake of the sale announced in April 2008.
Heineken, which acquired S & N’s UK operations, including the Tadcaster brewery, is being accused of reneging on promises to continue to make discretionary pension increases for those who were in service before 1997, bringing them into line with the retail price index up to five per cent.
Such inflation-proofing is automatic for anyone starting after 1997.
Brewers, salesmen and publicans are voicing their objections to a Commons Select Committee for Business, Innovation and Skills saying that the promise was part of the original deal.
But the Dutch brewery denies this, saying it only agreed to consider the increases and stressing that payments were discretionary.
Meanwhile, critics of Heineken are claiming that since Heineken decided to make no increases retirement benefis have shrunk by seven per cent in real terms for 9,500 former S & N staff.
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