ELEVEN Geelong cleaners claim they were sacked because they joined the union.

The workers picketed Melbourne Remand Centre in protest  but directed their real scorn at Geelong labour hirer Workforce Extensions.

The company hired the cleaners to fill a cleaning contract at the prison.

The cleaners claim Workforce Extensions' Geelong partner Ken McIntyre recently tried to fool them into signing a uniform casual employee contract.

According to the workers, when they turned to the union Mr McIntyre told them their employment at the prison was up for review.

They were informed last Friday their jobs had not been renewed.

The Australian Workers Union claimed it also discovered the cleaners were owed $42,000 in pay entitlements.

The AWU said the cleaners were working 40 hours per week with no penalty rates or casual loading.

"It's a strange coincidence that this review should have occured immediately after our involvement and under-payment claims," AWU organiser Brian Oates said.

"It's pretty reprehensible that people are on very low wages, work relatively hard and get treated so badly.

"But we often see this in low-paid areas like the cleaning industry where companies find it all too easy to phoenix the company and avoid their responsibilities to workers."

Staff at Geelong's Workforce Extensions said Mr McIntyre was ill yesterday and could not return Geelong Advertiser calls.

The Fair Work Australia tribunal ordered Mr McIntyre to meet with the union and workers a fortnight ago to thrash out details of the claims.

But Mr McIntyre told the union he had been too sick for the meeting.

The AWU is now pursuing action in the Magistrates' Court and say the cleaners face a drawn-out battle for their entitlements.

if Abbott gets in this sort of thing will increase, in fact I expect that Abbott will find some way of making Unions illegal, we all know how Howard treated the Unions and its members imagine Howard ten times worse, that Tony Abbott.