~ After airport maintains position on dismissal ~
PHILIPSBURG--The ABVO St. Maarten union says it will exhaust all necessary legal measures to get ten screeners who were fired for stealing perfumes from a perfume store at Princess Juliana International Airport SXM reinstated.
The union made the announcement on Wednesday after meeting with the Airport’s top brass, including Chief Operations Officer (COO) Michael Hyman, Chief Financial Officer (CFO), Human Resources official and legal representative earlier in the day.
In that meeting, the Airport maintained its decision to dismiss 10 employees and suspend six without pay for two weeks for stealing.
ABVO St. Maarten President Sharlon Cathalina and Secretary of Organisation Urvin Sjen-Liep-Shi told The Daily Herald that despite the union’s pleas and lobbying for the Airport to pursue other means of punishing the workers, such as disciplining them, the Airport maintains its position.
The union said the Airport presented the union with its report on the matter, which stated that, according to information, it had received, the workers in question were guilty of theft. The union says that in the absence of eyewitnesses or recorded evidence, theft is something that can only be proven in a court of law.
The union maintains that this is not a case of stealing because the workers received permission from an employee of the perfume store to take damaged perfumes. He said six of the workers in question heard the worker say they could take items, while the others acted on second-hand information. When the manager of the store showed up subsequently, the missing perfumes were noted and Airport management was informed that a number of the items were gone.
The workers in question admitted to taking the perfumes, but said they had been given permission to take them. The six who were placed on suspension returned the perfumes voluntarily while the 10 who were fired did not. The union claims that the perfume store staffer who gave permission to take the perfumes later recanted her statement. The Airport workers in hot water said they were under the impression that they had a legitimate permission to take the items.
The union said the screeners had ample opportunity to remove items from the Airport in the period following the hurricane, when there were no witnesses, but did not touch or take anything, and maintained that they did not steal but took items with permission.
The union’s proposal was for the Airport to take disciplinary measures against the employees, but not fire them. “We think that the procedure should have been dealt better than this,” the union representatives said. “They have to prove theft. If you have permission, that is not theft.”
The union also claims that Airport management also went against the collective labour agreement (CLA) when it failed to inform the union that actions had been taken against workers within 24 hours of the workers being fired and suspended.
“We will be exhausting all legal measures against the Airport,” the union said, noting that some of the affected employees have racked up 20 and 30 years’ experience working at the facility without a blemish on their record. “They should have taken this into account when making their decision. There should have been a balance. Management is being way too rigid.”
The union said also that management has indicated that it will be making efforts to cut cost and is trying to convince the union that its move was not part of a process of downsizing. “There is no evidence of theft,” the union said.
In an unrelated matter, according to the union representatives, during Wednesday’s meeting, the Airport COO said he had submitted a report to the Prime Minister and Governor Eugene Holiday regarding Marines who had been looting primarily alcohol from the departure area at the Airport, while stationed there.
