Union calls on minister for sanctions on Smart Telecom
Sunday, July 03, 2005By Eamon Quinn
The Communications Workers Union (CWU) has written to the Minister for Education and Science, Mary Hanafin, seeking sanctions be taken against Smart Telecom amid claims that the telecoms firm sacked two senior union representatives at the company.
In a letter sent to Hanafin this weekend, the CWU claims that a recent €6million award to SmartTelecom of the Broadband for Schools contract should be reviewed because of what it claims is the “anti-union'‘ policy of the firm.
Smart Telecom won a contract last January to provide wireless, fixed-line and satellite broadband services to 1,041 schools.
CWU head of regulatory affairs and employment law, Michael Bride, claims in the letter that the “company with such an appalling record in relation to the breach of constitutional rights and . . . human rights, should not benefit to the tune of millions of euro of public money'‘.
Bride told Hanafin that he had raised the issue with the Irish Congress of Trade Unions and “at a meeting in Belfast with your colleague Minister of State Conor Lenihan under the auspices of Corporate and Social responsibility'‘.
Ciaran Casey, chief operating officer at Smart, said the company “completely refuted'‘ the claims made by the CWU.
“To be accused of this is outrageous and offensive. We pride ourselves in the way we deal with our staff,” he said.
Casey said that the two Limerick employees worked as pay phone engineers in an office that was being closed and that they had received severance allowances of four weeks pay for each year of service.
The CWU claims that two shop stewards who worked in Limerick were told early last month to work late to prepare for the arrival of the SmartTelecom chief executive the following day. Instead, the CWU claims that the visitors turned out to be a human resources consultant and the employees' line manager.
According to the CWU letter, the employees “were informed on the spot that ‘they were done' and were told to vacate the premises and leave their car keys.
“The locks in the office were being changed as this conversation was taking place.
“They had seven and eight years service respectively,” according to the letter.
The letter from CWU, which is a major stakeholder in Eircom, comes at a sensitive time for Smart. Smart has started legal proceedings against Eircom and is also bidding against the telecoms giant to buy Meteor.
