Sacked Without an Appeal for Organising to Ensure a Safe Workplace.
On the eve of International Working Women’s Day (Saturday 7th March) workers – all members of Organise! – IWA – employed at Obsidian and Echo Body Piercing Studios walked out of an unsafe work environment.
Their boss and owner of the studios, Pamela Wilson, had refused to move on Union recognition and demands from workers to sort out vaccinations for workers carrying out fittings and piercings. Anyone exposed to bodily fluids and blood as part of their work must be vaccinated against Hepatitis B.
“Pamela and her management were given numerous opportunities to meet with us to resolve this and other issues but instead chose to ignore us and continue to put us in danger. We first raised the issue of our safety along with other issues through our Union on Saturday 31st January. With no movement we refused to subject ourselves to risk of disease for a minute longer.”
Workers as a result walked out of an unsafe workplace on Saturday 7th March notifying their manager as to why and reporting the issue to the city council environmental health team. By Friday 20th March they had won and were invited back to work in reduced – safe – roles “focused on non-piercing or non-fitting tasks” while their employer took steps to ensure a safe working environment. They began returning to work on the 26th March. As they did so antibody tests and renewed courses of vaccinations were arranged for two of them. Organise! IWA also made it clear that workers were to return without detriment and that we were hopeful of meeting management to discuss other outstanding issues. Workers were paid in full for hours they would have worked between the walk out and their return – a further acknowledgement that they had acted correctly in removing themselves from an unsafe workplace.
Antibody and vaccination appointments took place on the 24th and 26th of March. The first full-time workers returned on Thursday the 26th and Monday the 30th of March followed by part-time workers as their shifts were rostered.
The first indications that the employer was out for ‘revenge’ against workers who had the temerity to ensure their own safety came when two of the workers were informed that their contracts as apprentice piercers would not be honoured.
Then on 1st April a part-time worker showed up for her first shift having been told to expect a back to work chat and retraining, they were asked to attend early to complete the training. After being used to cover the manager’s lunch break she was handed a letter informing her that she was being immediately suspended with pay pending a disciplinary. As other workers attended subsequent shifts they were handed similar letters.
As workers were provided with ‘evidence’ it became clear that they were facing disciplinaries for the walk out on safety grounds under the guise of ‘damaging trust’ with their employer!
Despite the ‘evidence’ compiled against them by the cut-throat HR company Peninsula the facts are clear – the workers walked out of an unsafe workplace, returned as soon as steps were taken to make that workplace safe and being informed, insincerely, that they would be welcomed back.
On the day of their disciplinaries – April 21st – Union representation was denied. One of the workers went ahead with their hearing under protest while the others submitted written responses.
Solidarity is Strength
We are appealing for solidarity while workers step up their dispute with their boss and Peninsula HR. Appeals have lodged but we have little faith in a fair hearing. Replacement staff were employed before the disciplinary process was completed and the workers were notified that they had been sacked. The workers, who remain solid in the face of the provocations of a vindictive employer, are calling for a boycott of Obsidian and Echo Piercing Studios and will be organising protests against both their employer and the HR company Peninsula. A crowdfunder for economic hardship has been started in their support at: https://www.crowdfunder.co.uk/p/support-sacked-obsidian-echo-workers
