Wal-Mart employees kept inside store after bomb scare
Posted: Wed Jul 12, 2006 7:36 am
How interesting!
Wal-Mart employees kept inside store after bomb scare
July 12, 2006 - nupge.ca
Directed by managers to help police search
for explosives; company spokesman claims
workers could have left if they had asked
St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec (13 July 2006) - How badly do Wal-Mart employees need a union? Consider this:
Employees were kept on the job to help local police search for explosives after a bomb scare Tuesday at a Wal-Mart store in this community, 60 kilometres east of Montreal. Customers were asked to leave. The directive was given by Wal-Mart managers at the store.
Mailie Fournier, a former employee at the store, said some 40 nervous employees spent an hour combing through premises under the supervision of management and the police. Nothing was found but many of the employees found the experience traumatic, he said.
Safety board investigating
The Quebec workplace safety board is now reported to be investigating.
Wal-Mart's explanation for keeping employees in a potentially life-threatening situation was that it was merely assisting police. Yet on the face of it, the incident was an extreme, even for anti-union Wal-Mart managers.
Questioned afterward by a reporter, a spokesman for the Arkansas-based, multi-billion-dollar corporation was quoted as saying - despite clearly established facts to the contrary - that Wal-Mart would never "put in jeopardy the security of our employees."
"Never, never, never (will) we force them to do such kinds of investigations," spokesperson Yanik Deschenes was quoted by The Canadian Press.
"If this associate had said or all the associates had said `We don't want to participate', there would be no problem. They would have been able to leave the building without hesitation." NUPGE
Wal-Mart employees kept inside store after bomb scare
July 12, 2006 - nupge.ca
Directed by managers to help police search
for explosives; company spokesman claims
workers could have left if they had asked
St-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec (13 July 2006) - How badly do Wal-Mart employees need a union? Consider this:
Employees were kept on the job to help local police search for explosives after a bomb scare Tuesday at a Wal-Mart store in this community, 60 kilometres east of Montreal. Customers were asked to leave. The directive was given by Wal-Mart managers at the store.
Mailie Fournier, a former employee at the store, said some 40 nervous employees spent an hour combing through premises under the supervision of management and the police. Nothing was found but many of the employees found the experience traumatic, he said.
Safety board investigating
The Quebec workplace safety board is now reported to be investigating.
Wal-Mart's explanation for keeping employees in a potentially life-threatening situation was that it was merely assisting police. Yet on the face of it, the incident was an extreme, even for anti-union Wal-Mart managers.
Questioned afterward by a reporter, a spokesman for the Arkansas-based, multi-billion-dollar corporation was quoted as saying - despite clearly established facts to the contrary - that Wal-Mart would never "put in jeopardy the security of our employees."
"Never, never, never (will) we force them to do such kinds of investigations," spokesperson Yanik Deschenes was quoted by The Canadian Press.
"If this associate had said or all the associates had said `We don't want to participate', there would be no problem. They would have been able to leave the building without hesitation." NUPGE
