Eight union workers at Hume Industry's ceiling factory in Ipoh have been remanded by the police from Monday, over investigations into allegations of factory sabotage.

However, Hume local union representatives today said the 32 police reports made by their employer against them - claiming sabotage through arson, destruction of machinery, and threats made against non-union workers, among others - were completely baseless.

"We feel that the management is merely trying to find excuses to harass union members, and the police should not be abetting them by harassing workers as well," said union deputy president Zainuddin Abdul Ghani.

Union exco member Mohd Azizi, 26, was the first to be arrested on Monday, followed by Sarjit Singh, 34, on Tuesday.

V Aranasalam, 27, R Kamaraju, 26, and exco member Mohd Zaman, 24, were taken in late yesterday, while Hasbullah, 32, Azmi Bakar and exco member Ganapathy were arrested at pre-dawn today.

The Ipoh Magistrate's Court today allowed an application by the police to remand until Oct 1 the six who were arrested yesterday and today.

Mohd Azizi was released today. All are union members.

Pressure union members

"Think about it logically - why would workers burn down a factory, which is their main source of income?" said Zainuddin.

"They filed a police report claiming that we want to sabotage. But none of this makes sense. Who would be willing to jeopardise their only source of income? Clearly the allegations were made to pressure union members."

The fire broke out on Aug 21 in the R & D section of the factory.

Zainuddin said among other 'baseless claims' by Hume was that certain parts of the equipment broke because of sabotage.

"As far as I know, the parts they refer to break easily, usually every two weeks. This is not unusual. This is regular wear and tear that happens to equipment material," he said.

"They also complained that gloves and hats were found in the machines. But this is also not unusual, as equipment sometimes shake causing workers' belongings to fall in between the crevices of the machine."

According to NGO worker M Sarasvathy, Hume management began lodging police reports only after Aug 13, when management and the union failed to settle the dispute over the terms in the collective agreement.

According to her, the dispute is centred on wage increments and allowances. The collective agreement dispute has since been referred to the Industrial Relations Court.

Police bias

Sarasvathy, who is with the Support Committee for Factory Workers, also claims that police action following Hume's complaints showed clear bias on the part of the investigating officers.

She said that despite the workers giving their assurance that they are willing to cooperate with investigations, police action continued to treat the workers as though they were already guilty.

"When they first arrested the three at around 11pm yesterday, they never indicated that they were going to arrest the other three early this morning. They let them go home and then chose to arrest the others in their homes at 2am and 4am," she said.

"Why did they choose to do this, in front of their families and at such an hour?"

"They also came and took down the all ten fingerprints of all union workers. Why do they need to take such high-handed measures?" she said, adding that regular police patrols on factory grounds also made workers very uncomfortable.

"Fingerprinting should only be done on criminals, not workers.

"Workers complained that in the past one month, the factory has started to resemble a police station."

Neither Hume Industries nor Ipoh district police chief Ismail Abdullah could be reached for comment.