Workers sacked for leaving an unsafe workplace.
Boycott Obsidian and Echo Body Piercing Belfast!
Solidarity is Strength!

Organise-IWA || After returning to work when their employer made the necessary changes to ensure them a safe workplace – and paid them for the duration they had removed themselves – all the workers were sacked on egregious charges.

Workers at Obsidian and Echo Body Piercing studios in Belfast were all sacked on Thursday 30th April – on the eve of May Day, international workers day. It is clear to each and every one of the workers and to Organise! IWA that they were sacked for walking out of work on the 7th of March due to ongoing exposure to blood and bodily fluids without the employer having taken steps to ensure adequate vaccinations.

The workers’ case is solid. To the extent that on Friday 20th March they were invited back to work in reduced – safe – roles “focused on non-piercing or non-fitting tasks”. As the issue of safety around exposure to bodily fluids was being addressed the workers, who had removed themselves from an unsafe workplace on the 7th of March, prepared to return to work. 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 fulltime 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 their first shift having been told to expect a back to work chat and retraining, which they were asked to attend half an hour early to complete. Instead she was left on her own to cover the manager’s lunch break and after about an hour discovered she had been brought back to work only to be used as cover before being handed a letter informing her that she was being immediately suspended on pay. As other workers attended subsequent shifts they were handed similar letters. They were then informed that they would be given notice of disciplinary hearings.

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 told, insincerely, that they would be welcomed back. The initial dates provided for disciplinaries by the employer were put back to facilitate representation from their union, Organise! IWA and in order to study and respond to the ‘evidence’ presented. All of the disciplinaries were rearranged to Tuesday 21st of April to accommodate representation.

Twenty minutes into the first disciplinary the Organise! IWA union rep was kicked out. The other workers were informed that they could not be represented by their union! One went ahead under protest while the others submitted written responses to the cobbled together charges.

We are appealing for solidarity while workers step up their dispute with their boss and Peninsula HR.

Appeals are being lodged as is a case at Industrial Tribunal.

Workers 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.

CROWDFUNDER HERE