"A cleaner who helped organize a protest at a Facebook office over 'impossible' workloads has been suspended and could be fired, a report says", 13 September 2021

A cleaner who helped organized a protest over working conditions at a Facebook office has been suspended, and could be fired...

Guillermo Camacho...who works as a cleaner at Facebook's Brock Street office in London...was suspended after the company that runs the building asked for him to be removed...

On July 21, workers protested over what they claimed were "impossible workloads." The number of floors staff were expected to clean had increased from five to 12, according to the Cleaners & Allied Independent Workers Union (CAIWU)...

Camacho is the elected union representative for the cleaners, who are represented by the CAIWU.

The Brock Street office is owned by the real-estate company JLL.

The Observer reported that it had seen emails from JLL to Churchill asking for Camacho to be removed. The emails...were sent on the same day as the protest...They accused Camacho of failing to maintain a high standard of cleaning...

A spokesperson for JLL said it had "never instructed Churchill to remove any staff member because of union activity," adding that it respected "the rights of unions and employees to demonstrate."...

The CAIWU claims no additional staff were employed for the extra workload, and that cleaners were timed by Churchill...

A spokesperson for the Churchill Group told Insider that adjustments were made to cleaning schedules due to reduced occupancy in the Facebook buildings. While this included additional floors, it did not increase cleaners' workload because more were recruited, the spokesperson said.

"We have done (and we continue to do) our utmost to proactively manage our involvement with CAIWU, via positive engagement with our own workforce, to diffuse these false and damaging statements," they said.

"We will not comment on the specific details of individual cases, but we are confident with the governance of our HR processes...We can confirm that any employee relations matters are unrelated to any protest activity or Union involvement..." they said.

The spokesperson added that Churchill times some tasks "in order to ensure they are achievable. They are also completed by the management team and undergo time and motion reviews specifically designed to each site."

The company added that it placed employee wellbeing above all else, and that it had not seen any extended sickness or increased sickness on this contract, nor had any concerns been raised...

CAIWU accused Facebook of failing to act when contacted by union representatives over workload. Facebook managers at the UK office had insisted that they were not the correct company to deal with the complaints, per emails seen by the Observer...

... a Facebook spokesperson told Insider: "...we ensured all of our contract workers continued to be paid throughout the pandemic, including when offices were closed.

"As a Facebook supplier, JLL must adhere to our strict vendor standards, including ensuring that anyone contracted is paid the London Living Wage as minimum."