Connect said its members called on the head of Meta Ireland and Ibec President Anne O’Leary to end alleged attempts by management to undermine workers’ right to conduct trade union activity “without fear of retribution”.
Around 20 Connect members who work as critical facility engineers at the Meta data centre in Clonee, Co Meath, will mount pickets during a 24-hour work stoppage that starts at 7am on Monday.
The union is in dispute with the company over changes made to workers’ shift patterns.
Connect claims that more shifts have been added to the rosters and there is a greater workload for its members.
Connect official Brian McAvinue claimed workers have experienced what “amounts to a campaign of bullying” by the company.
He alleged that it threatened to outsource their jobs and they have been quizzed about union activity.
Meta has denied this, saying it was made clear to the workers that it had no intention of outsourcing the roles.
“This has occurred in one-to-one meetings between our members and management which the workers were instructed to attend,” said Mr McAvinue.
“It is clear that these meetings were aimed at undermining our members’ determination to collectively engage with management. It is also clear that the company does not respect the right of workers in Ireland to undertake official industrial action when their terms and conditions of employment are unilaterally changed against their wishes.”
He said what he had heard from members in recent days concerning the tactics employed by the company amounted to a “well-planned campaign of coercion aimed at creating a culture of fear in the workplace”.
The union official said Meta refuses to respect the industrial relations mechanisms of the state and engage with the Workplace Relations Commission or Labour Court.
“Our members are calling on the Head of Meta Ireland Anne O’Leary, who was also recently appointed president of the employer group Ibec, to end the attempts by her management to undermine a worker’s right to conduct trade union activity without fear of retribution,” he said.
“She must also explain why her company has snubbed the state’s own industrial relations bodies.”
A Meta spokesperson said the industrial action does not affect the data centre operations and involves a small group of employees who were asked to implement a new shift pattern in May.
“While we respect the right to take industrial action, we have been consulting directly with these employees over the past six months to discuss the change and agree ways in which their existing highly competitive compensation and benefits package would be adjusted to reflect the change,” they said.
Connect assistant general secretary, Brian Nolan, said Ibec has repeatedly stated that there is no need to introduce new laws to protect trade union activity as ‘union busting’ doesn’t exist in Ireland.
“This position can be most politely termed as ‘ironic’ when the current activity of the Ibec’s president’s own company is revealed.”
