IGH Hotels slammed for 'fire and rehire' practices in Glasgow

IHG Hotels, who own The Grand Central and The Blythswood, have been accused of advertising jobs shortly after terminating the same contracts. 

A demonstration is being held outside the company's Glasgow hotels today amid claims the chain also dismissed "all reasonable alternatives to compulsory redundancy".

Jamie McCann, who is a former Receptionist at Grand Central Hotel, said: “Alongside almost 250 colleagues, I was terminated from my job as a receptionist at Voco Grand Central Hotel in September 2020, despite proposing multiple alternatives to avoid mass compulsory redundancy.

"In October, I was forwarded on an email from the Head of HR inviting some colleagues back to the hotel. I then saw an advert for my exact same job.

"Indeed, I applied for this job but was told they were no longer looking for front office staff."

READ MORE: Grand Central Hotel to reopen after multi-million investment

IHG hit the headlines last year when they terminated 95% of workers at Grand Central Hotel and The George in Edinburgh - citing closures of both hotels as the reasoning, only to re-open a few weeks later.

The contracts of around 500 workers were terminated and put on statutory minimum severance packages. Union bosses claim the company used public money to pay the notice pay of minimum wage workers.

Jamie added: "I believe our jobs could have been saved had the hotel used the Job Retention Scheme as intended or at least listened to our alternative proposals. Instead, I was terminated with less than £500 in severance package, mostly covered by the taxpayer.”

Unite Hospitality organiser, Bryan Simpson, said: “As one of the largest and most profitable hotel chains in the world, IHG could and should have retained these workers using the Job Retention Scheme.

"The company even had the front to use the furlough scheme to pay the notice pay of redundant workers. If that wasn’t morally reprehensible enough, they then invited some of these same workers back on reduced hours and wages.” 

READ MORE: Glasgow Crime Stories: The day a security guard's family was taken hostage in Ibrox

A spokesman for the hotel group argued the company had considered "all options" to preserve jobs. 

He said: "We considered all options to avoid, reduce or mitigate redundancies at these hotels. However, despite working tirelessly to preserve employment opportunities, including use of CJRS, we ultimately had to restructure our teams given the prolonged impact of the pandemic on our industry.

"We followed a fair and transparent process that allowed all colleagues to fully participate and remain committed to re-employing as many of our former team members as we can when business returns to these hotels.”