The Eagle Services Asia (ESA) was found to have been laying off its employees without negotiating with the unions, said the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) on Wednesday (29 July), adding that it has stepped in to halt the firm’s retrenchment exercise.
ESA is a joint venture between SIA Engineering Company (49%) and Pratt & Whitney (51%). It’s worth noting that the SIA Engineering Company is also run by Temasek Holdings.
Previously on 28 July, it was reported that ESA has retrenched 144 of its employees between 22 and 24 July, but the firm refuted the retrenchment allegations and assured that all its employees were still on its payroll.
It claimed that some affected workers were allowed to take paid leave to wait for the outcome of its negotiations with the three unions – namely the Air Transport Executive Staff Union, SIA Engineering Company Engineers and Executives Union and the Singapore Airlines Staff Union.
Following that, the NTUC said in a joint statement with the three unions on Wednesday (29 July) that ESA had proceeded to retrench its workers on 22 July without finalising a name list with the unions, despite it was locked in negotiations with the unions to keep jobs.
“When the unions were alerted that ESA management had gone ahead to start informing employees that they may be retrenched, the National Trades Union Congress (NTUC) and the unions took decisive action and stepped in to stop any further action by the company until an agreement could be reached.
“The lack of transparency and disregard for negotiations with the unions is not acceptable and is not how a retrenchment exercise should be conducted,” it stated.
Channel News Asia reported that even as the unions continued negotiations with ESA, they separately engaged with their members.
In fact, a secret ballot which authorised by the NTUC’s secretary-general Ng Chee Meng has been conducted to sanction legal industrial action to “rectify any shortcomings and improve the retrenchment process, if and where necessary”.
Mr Ng who lost his parliamentary position in the recent General Election, also took to Facebook on Wednesday noting that he was informed about an “unfair” retrenchment exercise by workers and unions a week ago. In response, he gave the assurance that the NTUC will intervene to protect them.
“At that time, NTUC Singapore, the Air Transport Executive Staff Union, SIA Engineering Company Engineers and Executives Union, and Singapore Airlines Staff Union were in tense negotiations to fight for a fair and dignified retrenchment,” he wrote.
Mr Ng further noted, “To let everyone understand that NTUC will stand up to protect our workers, I authorised our unions to prepare for industrial action should it become necessary to persuade management not to take unilateral decisions. We wanted a fair negotiation.”
