Berman Attacks Lockheed for Layoffs : Congress: The representative says that the company showed workers ‘the back of its hand’ as he testified for a jobless benefits bill.

Rep. Howard L. Berman (D-Panorama City) blasted Lockheed Corp. Thursday for showing “bad faith” in dealing with the 6,000 employees who are expected to lose their jobs when the aerospace company pulls much of its operation out of Burbank by the mid-1990s.

“An enormous part of Lockheed’s success in Southern California has come from the ingenuity, dedication and loyalty of the women and men who have worked for the company, some for 20, 30 or even 40 years, and have stood by it in times of trouble,” Berman told the House Armed Services Committee on Investigations in Washington.

“For their loyalty, Lockheed is showing workers the back of its hand,” he said.

Berman was testifying on behalf of a bill that would provide benefits--including job training and relocation expenses--for employees of defense contractors put out of work by recent military cutbacks. He called on Lockheed to implement programs of its own that would ease the impact of its departure on employees.

Lockheed announced May 8 that it was pulling much of its operation out of Burbank by the mid-1990s to move to newer facilities in Palmdale and Marietta, Ga. Nearly 6,000 workers are expected to lose their jobs, either through layoffs or early retirement. Lockheed spokesman Jim Ragsdale said many of the buildings at its 320-acre Burbank facility were built as temporary structures during World War II and some date back to 1928, when Lockheed first located near what is now Burbank Airport.

“As a minimum, the company should be offering right of first hire at new facilities, extending health benefits so families do not suffer and ensuring that retirement benefits remain intact for those laid off,” he said.

Berman added that the departure of the company was particularly traumatic because many of the Lockheed employees who are being laid off moved last year from Los Angeles to Palmdale after the company announced it would move most of its operation there.

He said that no program cancellation by the federal government had forced Lockheed to scale back its operations.

“What is beyond doubt is that the decision to move was made in a climate of mismanagement and bad faith negotiation with the workers,” Berman said.

Lockheed spokesmen defended the company’s existing programs for laid-off employees and said the current layoffs are the result of a slowdown in the aerospace industry, not the result of mismanagement, as charged by Berman.

“It is simply not true that the layoffs that are occurring throughout the aerospace industry are the result of companies deciding that its a good idea to lay people off. They are occurring because of very pronounced changes that are taking place in the field of defense contracting,” Ragsdale said.

“In Lockheed’s case, the layoffs are happening because the business base is declining and not for any other reason,” Ragsdale said.

Lockheed already offers right of first hire to laid-off employees, but the policy is complicated by several contracts with unions in different divisions of the company, he said.

Answering Berman’s call for extended health insurance, Ragsdale said Lockheed currently pays a month’s coverage after an employee is laid off and offers group insurance rates for another 18 months.

“We are complying with federal law, and going beyond it in many cases,” Lockheed spokesman Ross B. Hopkins said.

Since the announcement of the layoffs, government officials and labor leaders have sought to soften the economic blow of the company’s departure. The Los Angeles City Council, for example, will meet in the San Fernando Valley next month to study the economic impact of the pullout and consider programs to deal with it.

Officials from the union that represents many of Lockheed’s workers in Burbank, the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers, could not be reached for comment on Berman’s testimony.