Retaliation Against Whistleblowers Threats, Retaliation, and Litigation

[Omaha Steve]

http://www.focusong4s.org/violating-american-workers-rig/


UNITED STATES

Threats, Retaliation, and Litigation: G4S in the United States

Employees throughout the United States have come forward with stories of Wackenhut retaliating against whistleblowers speaking out for the public safety, violating its workers’ basic legal rights, and interfering with its workers’ fundamental right to organize a union.

Retaliation Against Whistleblowers

The United States Nuclear Regulatory Commission and other government bodies have also found repeated incidents of Wackenhut illegally retaliating against whistleblowers who call attention to poor security practices at sensitive installations like nuclear power plants and a site producing plutonium and uranium for nuclear weapons. Read more at Eye on Wackenhut.

Wage and Hour Violations

Wackenhut employees also report that the company has violated U.S. wage and hour laws. In one example, Wackenhut employees report that supervisors asked workers to work up to 7 days a week, up to 20 hours at a time, and sign false time sheets.

Right to Organize

Judges and arbitrators have repeatedly found that Wackenhut interferes with its workers’ right to organize. In one case, the company unlawfully threatened and interrogated security officers exercising their workplace rights.

The Service Employees International Union has joined together with security providers, clients, city officials, and public safety experts in an effort to create partnerships between labor, management, and government to address the security industry’s key problems of poor training and high staff turnover. Wackenhut has refused to participate. Instead, it brags of its relationships with “specialized” unions that organize only security guards. In reality, it has been involved in extensive litigation against two of the major security guard unions. Read more in our Alternative Annual Report, Group 4 Securicor: The High Cost of the Low Road.

Many Wackenhut clients are unwilling to tolerate these labor abuses and their impact on the quality of the security that Wackenhut provides. The CEO of Qwest, which was then one of Wackenhut’s national clients, wrote to Wackenhut in 2004 that, “Wackenhut has been repeatedly and categorically denying its employees the ability to join a union...It is very concerning that one of our national vendors…would not listen to its employees.” Like Qwest, the International Monetary Fund, Blue Cross/Blue Shield, and the Department of Homeland Security, have chosen to stop using Wackenhut’s services.
Have your rights been violated by Wackenhut? Tell us your story.