HONGKONG AND SHANGHAI BANK CORPORATION EMPLOYEES’ UNION
(HSBCEU)
In the interest of justice and fair play, we would like to air our side to correct wrong impressions and any misrepresentation about the Bank’s grossly – slanted account of the problem that may have been created in the minds of the public through paid advertisements.
To begin with, our Union was constrained to undertake peaceful picket and related activities starting January 20, 1993, in protest against the Bank’s refusal to suspend implementation of a non-executive job evaluation program it arbitrarily put into effect unilaterally downgrading CBA-stipulated entry-level salary rates.
The Bank’s action, which was clearly meant to preempt our Union’s right to negotiate the wage question in contract reopener talks scheduled to start the following month, is violative of the express warranty in our CBA against “diminution of existing rights, privileges and benefits already granted and enjoyed by the employees.”
In the coursed of the reopener negotiations that took place beginning February, the Bank informed our Union that it considered the setting of wage rates as a management prerogative not subject to collective bargaining. Our Union naturally expressed vigorous objection to such blatantly unlawful stand taken by the Bank, pointing out that the law recognizes wage-setting as a mandatory -- indeed the primordial – subject of collective bargaining. When our Union insisted on its right to negotiate the wage issue, the Bank unilaterally declared a suspension of the talks. Its avowed reason: our Union engaged in bad-faith bargaining for carrying on with its concerted activities while the negotiations were in progress. This, clearly, is untenable. Our Union’s peaceful protest activities had been ongoing even before the talks began and the Bank was fully aware when it subsequently sat down with our Union at the bargaining table of our Union’s vow, communicated to the management as early as the month before, to carry on with its concerted activities “until such time when the implementation of this program is suspended and a settlement to this dispute is agreed upon.”
The obvious reason for the Bank’s downgrading entry-level pay rates is to replace present rank-and-file staff, whom it grudgingly describes as “averaging a gross pay of P18,000.00 per month (inclusive of tax-free benefit)” with new hires who will be paid at the drastically-reduced salary rate of P6,500.00 per month.
Anyway, if – as claimed by it – “the Hongkong Bank’s remuneration package is by far the best in the country today,” this is not due to the Management’s benevolence but to our Union members’ gritty persistent struggle for improvement of their lot which they have through three decades of responsible unionism in the Bank.
With the one-sidedness of the media, Management has declared our strike illegal, officially announced in a press conference, held at the Diamond Hotel last December 28, 1993. Termination letters were also served the striking employees since December 27, 1993. The names of the terminated employees were posted in public view all at the ingresses and egresses of the Royal Match Building at Makati, where the Bank hold office, and of the HongkongBank Centre at Ortigas, Pasig City.
As Filipino employees of a foreign bank, we do not see how we can really move on to a bright Philippines 2000, given this trend of sacrificing Filipinos for the sake of progress. Can we really progress as a nation by sacrificing justice on the altar of greed and foreign manipulation? Can we really be proud of being Filipinos when we are looked down upon as a nation of domestic helpers and cheap labor? Shall we also be treated as servants in our very own country?
Humiliating the employees of HSBCby announcing the termination of 152 employees
A Smiling HSBC CEOfor a job well done in busting a harmless employees’ union
Filipino Security Guards Protecting British Interest
The British Gentlemen at work “banking or union busting”?
An abused Hongkong Bank Filipino Employee Only in the Philippines
I am a part of the HSBC - Employees Union who stood up for the rights of every Filipino worker and peacefully demonstrated against HSBC (formerly known by its full name Hongkong and Shanghai Banking Corporation) 18 years ago.
ReplyDeleteIn 1993 or 18 years ago, my youngest child was still in kindergarten while my other two were in grade school, when I tearfully broke the news to my kids that they might not finish school because mommy no longer had a job, being illegally terminated.
It is now 2011 and my youngest has finished college a few months ago. God is good in that all my children have finished school.
But several of my former officemates are not as fortunate.. some have almost become homeless if not for other family and friends who were kind to them.. Some succumbed to illness and without enough money for hospital bills, have already passed on to the next life without seeing justice in this one.
Justice delayed is justice denied... We keep on praying that our case, now with the Supreme Court, will finally be decided on with all fairness and in full rule of law.
It has often been a very hard struggle. But we continue on because the Filipino worker deserves to be treated with respect in his/ her own country.
The Hongkong and Shanghai Bangking Corp. Ltd. (HSBC) a British bank which claims to be the world's local bank did not only take our jobs but foreclosed also our family homes including who have no arrears in their amortizations. Also management through its British officials and some Filipino managers were really determined to crash not only the union but also our spirits by the filing of cases in courts against some staff. Is this the way of treating your Filipino employees who from the time the bank opened business in the Philippines about a century ago have worked with dedication, honesty and fidelity with yourselves and definitely have contributed immensely to the Bank's progress and success as one of the leading financial institutions in the country today?
ReplyDeleteThe case of illegal dismissal we filed against the Bank is still pending in the Supreme Court since February 2003 (G.R. 156635) and our struggle for justice is on its 18h year already. There are cases in the Supreme Court which were filed much later that our case that have been decided already and I am wondering why this labor dispute against the Hongkong Bank a giant multinational company remains unresolved to date.