LONDON, April 4 (Reuters) – Hundreds of Google staff staged a walkout on the firm’s London workplaces on Tuesday, following a dispute over layoffs.
In January, Google’s guardian firm Alphabet (GOOGL.O) introduced it was shedding 12,000 staff worldwide, equal to 6% of its international workforce.
The transfer got here amid a wave of job cuts throughout company America, notably in the tech sector, which has thus far seen firms shed greater than 290,000 workers for the reason that begin of the yr, in accordance with monitoring web site Layoffs.fyi.
Trade union Unite, which counts lots of of Google’s UK staff amongst its members, mentioned the corporate had ignored considerations put ahead by staff.
“Our members are clear: Google needs to listen to its own advice of not being evil,” mentioned Unite regional officer Matt Whaley.
“They and Unite will not back down until Google allows workers full union representation, engages properly with the consultation process and treats its staff with the respect and dignity they deserve.”
A Google worker attending the protest, who requested to not be named for worry of retaliation, instructed Reuters that talks between staff and administration had been “extremely frustrating.”
“It has been difficult for those involved. We have a redundancy process for a reason, so that employees can make their voice heard,” they mentioned. “But it feels as if our concerns have fallen on deaf ears.”
Google’s senior administration has been engaged in redundancy talks in many elements of Europe, in line with native employment legal guidelines.
Last month, workers on the firm’s Zurich workplace in Switzerland staged an analogous walkout, with worker representatives claiming Google had rejected their proposals to cut back job cuts.
“As we said on January 20, we’ve made the difficult decision to reduce our workforce by approximately 12,000 roles globally. We know this is a very challenging time for our employees,” a Google spokesperson mentioned.
“In the UK, we have been constructively engaging and listening to our employees through numerous meetings, and are working hard to bring them clarity and share updates as soon as we can in adherence with all UK processes and legal requirements.”
Google employs greater than 5,000 individuals in the United Kingdom.
Reporting by Martin Coulter
Editing by Mark Potter and Christina Fincher
Our Standards: The Thomson Reuters Trust Principles.