Workers at Meta data centre to strike next week in row over shift changes.
Workers at a Meta data centre are set to go on strike on Monday in a row over shift changes.
Critical facility engineers employed at the data centre in Clonee, Co Meath, will mount pickets during the 24-hour stoppage that will begin at 7am.
Their trade union, Connect, said the industrial action follows a unilateral change to their terms and conditions of employment involving new shift working arrangements.
Connect official Brian McAvinue said the workers are vital to ensure the smooth operation of the data centre.
He said the overwhelming majority of members backed industrial action.
Mr McAvinue said they have been left with no option but industrial action due to a “complete disregard” shown to them by management due to a unilateral change to their terms and conditions of employment.
The union official said Meta made a small number of critical facility engineers redundant last year and the new working arrangements were imposed on members “as a direct result of a now under-resourced workforce”.
He claimed the company has compressed a six-week shift arrangement into four weeks that means there are more shifts and an increased workload.
The new arrangement means members have to work more weekends and night shifts, he said. “This new four-week shift cycle has been introduced since September 16, despite our members not agreeing, nor were counter proposals from our members considered,” he said.
Members of the union wanted to be represented by Connect during talks with Meta, which owns and operates Facebook, Instagram and WhatsApp, he said.
He claimed the company refused to engage with the union and instead engaged with members using “failed internal mechanisms”.
“Meta, despite relying on Connect trade union labour and the influence of this union to build its data centre in which we supported the safe reopening of the construction site during Covid-19, now refuses to recognise Connect trade union for the purpose of collective bargaining,” he said, adding that Meta refused an invitation to attend the Workplace Relations Commission or Labour Court.
The union wanted the tech giant to suspend the introduction of the new shift arrangements until the court issued a recommendation.
“We also must make it very clear to Meta that any attempt to cover our members’ work with non-union members would be a major escalation of this dispute which would require a response from our union,” he said.
It is understood that the new shift pattern was seen as a way of streamlining operations at the data centre.
A Meta spokesperson said the industrial action involves a small group of employees who were asked to implement a new shift pattern in May.
The spokesperson said:
While we respect the right to take industrial action, we have been consulting directly with these employees over the past six months to discuss the change and agree ways in which their existing highly competitive compensation and benefits package would be adjusted to reflect the change.
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Workers at Meta data centre to strike next week in row over shift changes. source
