A protest in support of six cleaners, who claim they were removed from the jobs they held at an EU-founded organisation which monitors employees' working conditions, is to be held in Dublin this afternoon.
The six employees, who had worked at the European Foundation for the Improvement of Living and Working Conditions (Eurofound) for between 16 and 20 years, say they were sacked after they complained about mistreatment and poor working conditions.
The foundation, which is based in Loughlinstown, Dublin 18, is an EU-funded organisation charged with monitoring working and living conditions in Europe.
The workers concerned were not directly employed by Eurofound but by a series of contractors over the years. They claim that working conditions deteriorated when AFM Ireland, a Blanchardstown-based cleaning company took over the cleaning contract at the premises 18 months ago.
According to the workers, wages were not paid on time or were incorrect; holiday pay was also incorrect; cleaning equipment was faulty, and repeated promises by AMS to deduct union dues were broken. The employees claim they were sacked after they refused to continue to work after a number of them developed respiratory problems due to cleaning chemicals supplied by the company.
The workers were replaced by four Lithuanians.
Speaking this afternoon, Richard Boyd Barrett of the People Before Profit Alliance said that AFM had exploited immigrant workers and used them to undermine existing workers rights and conditions.
"It is simply incredible that this could happen to workers, working in a foundation that is funded by EU taxpayers and run by the EU commission, specifically to monitor the conditions of workers. It's something of a sick joke," said Mr Boyd Barrett.
Speaking to
The
Irish Timesthis afternoon, AFM Ireland's director Paul Higgins denied the six employees had been sacked and said that he was "absolutely shocked" that the protest was taking place.
Mr Higgins said there had only been one instance in which the cleaners had been paid late and that this had been due to a problem with the company accounting system. He also said that the employees had been overpaid holiday money and claimed there had never been a complaint concerning the chemicals used by the company before.
"I have the same chemicals in use at quite a number of sites and there's no issue with them. If there was, we would have removed them immediately and I'd have been in touch with the suppliers about it. It seems like they are making a case over nothing," said Mr Higgins.
"The women say they were sacked but they gave us notice that they were leaving. We asked them to stay, we wanted them to stay but they said they were leaving and that was it. We left it right up to the Monday to try and replace them and it was only when we didn't have a full complement of staff that we took on other people," he added.
Mr Higgins also denied AFM had taken on new cleaners at a lower wage.
"We are subject to the Joint Labour Council wage rates and I can guarantee that everyone is paid the same rates so it's not a question of a Lithuanian person coming in and being paid less than an Irish person, that just didn't happen at all and wouldn't happen."
A spokesman for Eurofound told the
Irish Timesthe organisation had a facilities contract in place with a company called Vector Management, who in turn employs AFM for cleaning services at its premises.
"We have very strict guidelines on how we impose rights onto our contractors and if there's anything coming out of this we would look at that again," said the spokesman.
