After Pacific Century CyberWorks (PCCW) announced that it would lay off 858 employees, two of the company's three unions have urged the telecommunications company's roughly 13,000 workers to join a work-to-rule campaign starting immediately.
Roughly half of the company's 13,000 workers belong to unions. "I hope this will pressure the management to talk to our union and stop all further retrenchments," Terry Ip, chairman of the 2,000-member PCCW Staff Association, told local television network TVB during a candlelight protest outside the company's headquarters. He said the action would affect the company's operations because most staff worked an average of 90 minutes overtime per day. But he refused to estimate how many workers would join the action or the level of disruption it would cause. A second union, the 4,000-member PCCW Employees General Union, said it had also advised its members to join the industrial action.
PCCW said that it was laying off the 858 employees due to the adverse economy and tougher competition. The news came just days after CyberWorks reported a profit of HK$1.89 billion for 2001, compared with a loss of HK$129.3 billion in the previous year. CyberWorks laid off about 1,000 workers last year and has said it can't rule out further job cuts.
The telecommunications company said it had set up a HK$40 million fund to assist laid off employees facing severe financial hardship, half of the money to come from chairman Richard Li personally. The fund will also provide assistance to 506 workers sacked on December 5 last year. It will be administered by an independent committee chaired by Christine Fang Meng-sang, chief executive of the Hong Kong Council of Social Services. The committee will work out who will be eligible and how the money will be distributed. PCCW said it had set up professional job-finding services and a career-counselling programme to help the sacked staff.
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