‘We need to assert our power - or we’ll get trampled on’: the cleaner sacked for eating a tuna sandwich
Summary
Date Reported: 3 Aug 2024
Location: United Kingdom
Companies
Cleanology - Employer , etc.venues Ltd - ClientAffected
Total individuals affected: Number unknown
Migrant & immigrant workers: ( Number unknown - Burkina Faso , Cleaning & maintenance , Women , Unknown migration status )Issues
Wage Theft , Dismissal , Access to InformationResponse
Response sought: Yes, by Journalist
External link to response: (Find out more)
Action taken: Cleanology told journalists that the mistake in the worker's pay occurred only once, and that her incorrect use of the vacuum cleaner was a health and safety issue. The chief executive claims that her sacking was entirely lawful and rejects any suggestion of discrimination.
Source type: News outlet
Summary
Date Reported: 3 Aug 2024
Location: United Kingdom
Other
Not Reported ( Cleaning & maintenance ) - Employer , Not Reported ( Sector not reported/applicable ) - ClientAffected
Total individuals affected: 1
Migrant & immigrant workers: ( Number unknown - Americas , Cleaning & maintenance , Men , Unknown migration status )Issues
Dismissal , Harassment (other than sexual) , InjuriesResponse
Response sought: No
Action taken: After the support from a trade union, the worker defied his employer's attempts to fire him. He is now working back inside the 'media giant', but feels isolated and now works in what he describes as a 'horrible' atmosphere.
Source type: News outlet
…At the moment when Gabriela Rodriguez discovered she had been sacked for eating a tuna sandwich, she was carrying the bins out…
…Rodriguez joined the tens of thousands of Latin American migrants who have made their home in the capital in recent decades…The work was hard, and her employment structures fiendishly complicated…
…Rodriguez began a new set of jobs with Total Clean…
… She was dismissed with immediate effect, not only from Devonshires but also from her other job with Total Clean, at the clothing giant Stradivarius…
…Devonshires said Rodriguez was employed by Total Clean and that her dismissal took place without the law firm’s knowledge…Total Clean declined to comment…
The question of who is afforded basic humanity within the workplace, and who is denied it, defines so many similar cases, according to …an organiser at the United Voices of the World trade union, which now represents… is taking both Total Clean and Devonshires to an employment tribunal under a claim of unfair dismissal…
…UVW is currently representing another cleaner, Aoua Coulibaly, who was sacked in April by the outsourcing company Cleanology from her job at Etc.venues…
[Cleanology’s co-founder and chief executive is Dominic Ponniah] claims that her sacking was entirely lawful and rejects any suggestion of discrimination…Etc.venues did not respond to requests for comment…