The Guardian has an instructive article on the rights of abused workers in the States. It is based on the current Strauss-Kahn case and shows the danger of unfair dismissal laws of the type Kate Wilkinson and John Key aspire to.
One very important fact has been largely absent from the coverage of the sexual assault case against Dominique Strauss-Kahn, the former head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and, until latterly, leading candidate to be the next president of France. The hotel housekeeper whom he allegedly assaulted was represented by a union.
The reason that this is an important part of the story is that it is likely that Strauss-Kahn’s alleged victim might not have felt confident enough to pursue the issue with either her supervisors or law enforcement agencies, if she had not been protected by a union contract. The vast majority of hotel workers in the United States, like most workers in the private sector, do not enjoy this protection.
This matters because under the law in the United States, an employer can fire a worker at any time for almost any reason. It is illegal for an employer to fire a worker for reporting a sexual assault. If any worker can prove that this is the reason they were fired, they would get their job back and probably back pay. (The penalties tend to be trivial, so the back pay is, unfortunately, not a joke.)However, it is completely legal for an employer to fire a worker who reports a sexual assault for having been late to work last Tuesday or any other transgression. Since employers know the law, they don’t ever say that they are firing a worker for reporting a sexual assault. They might fire workers who report sexual assaults for other on-the-job failings, real or invented.
In this way, the United States stands out from most other wealthy countries. For example, all the countries of western Europe afford workers some measure of employment protection, where employers must give a reason for firing workers. Workers can contest their dismissal if they think the reason is not valid, unlike the United States where there is no recourse.
Imagine the situation of the hotel worker had she not been protected by a union contract. She is a young immigrant mother who needs this job to support her family. According to reports, she likely did not know Strauss-Kahn’s identity at the time she reported the assault, but she undoubtedly understood that the person staying in the $3,000-a-night suite was a wealthy and important person. In these circumstances, how likely would it be that she would make an issue of a sexual assault to her supervisors?
And conversely, that is precisely why the right wing privileged and rich elites and bullies want unfair dismissal laws and want to smash unions.
I’d fear for my job too if i had to take a sexual harassment case against the arch-socialist ex-next president of france. I note the lack of comment by feminists on this case. It’s appalling that the sisters are abandoned when one of the brothers commits a heinous act against on of them.
In another article on this scandal in this morning’s Dominion Christopher Kutz (Berkeley)makes the point that the French penal system universalised the penal treatment meeted out to aristocrats, while the US system univeralised that accorded to plantation slaves.
According to a leading US scholar, James Atleston, the US labor law system is much the same-its values and assumptions are founded on those of slavery and bonded labour. This of course is the system aspired to by the advocates for the ECA and the current usual business lobby suspects.
I suppose we were lucky that the ECA and the Court of Appeal only took us back to the nineteenth century law of master and servant. Until labour law is built on the fundamental assumption that workers are citizens with rights, rather than commodities to be utilised for the benefit of property owners reforms in labour law will flounder.
I doubt that being a union member was what drove her to the police.
If I remember the story correctly – the first she called was her brother – not a union, then the police (who her brother told her to call), again not the union.
Even the story above says “The reason that this is an important part of the story is that it is likely that Strauss-Kahn’s alleged victim might not have felt confident enough to pursue the issue with either her supervisors or law enforcement agencies”
So he dosnt even know – he just spews this based on what he thinks is likely. based off his own views.
But how could it be that a union might be helping, aren’t they always evil and don’t want business to succeed??
Anyone wanting to learn more about the strength of workers unions should watch Mike Moores “Capitalism a love story”
Any figures on how many sexual abuse cases NZ unions have taken up Trevor? And I am not talking about the teacher Unions have to deal with predators
Interesting that the rich frog is/was a socialist,freind of the people, power corrupts
@lollercaust
“I note the lack of comment by feminists on this case”. Maybe you’ve missed it, but there has been a lot of comment on the this case by feminists, including public protests in France
http://theillusionists.org/?p=1731
http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2011/05/25/accusing-the-accuser/
http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2011/05/24/who-is-the-victim-in-the-dsk-affair/
http://www.feministe.us/blog/archives/2011/05/17/accused-rapists-find-a-friend-in-bernard-henri-levy/
http://shakespearessister.blogspot.com/2011/05/two-facts.html
And also by NZ bloggers:
http://thehandmirror.blogspot.com/2011/05/high-price.html
Shane Goggin from Printlink printers in Wellington tells new staff member to f…off after that person is flown across the country to start the job,the verbal contract has been agreed, to start a fulltime job on nightshift.Another contrat is forced on that individual concerning the collective contract of which they have to sign t actually start the job,they are still not members of that contrat as tey are not paying members of the union.Goggin is informed incorrectly by whistleblower printer from Securacopy Wellington now based in the same building that the new worker was dismissed by them so that justifies the f…off statement.Goggin denies this initially but then tries to justify it with numerous lies.They were found guilty in court via witness statements of lying.They still work there……who is wrong?should they be sacked for breaking the law.Should the new worker be compensated for employment loss.Why would legal aid state that if I am Maori I can only take this through the treaty,is that legal.