NEW BEDFORD, Mass. — January 14, 2015 — Nearly a month after getting fired from a fish processing plant, mother of two Francisca Portillo has yet to find a job.
After participating in a Dec. 15 vigil in front of the company's Fish Island plant, Portillo and five others were fired by Norpel, or Northern Pelagic Group, which processes mackerel and herring,
"If the workplace is better, you do the work better and it's better for the bosses and the workers," Portillo said. "I don't feel I've done anything wrong — to the contrary.
" A week after the protest, advocates for the workers filed a complaint with the National Labor Relations Board in Boston, the independent federal agency that oversees labor disputes. The charge, aimed at Norpel as well as Employment on Demand Inc. — the temp agency that supplies workers to the company — alleges that they were fired as a result of striking. It also claims that one of the strikers was "physically assaulted" by a Norpel secretary.