Burger King Leaves Workers In The Dark Over Lockdown Pay

Burger King’s failure to let workers know before today what they will be paid during the lockdown is inexcusable says Unite Union.

“They have sent over 2,500 employees home without any idea of what their income will be during the lockdown. They have had the same time as every other employer to sort it out but haven’t - it is not acceptable and they have failed their employees” said National Secretary Gerard Hehir.

“Burger King are wholly owned by the Blackstone Group - one of the biggest private equity firms in the world and worth over US$ 34 billion. They can absolutely afford to pay their low paid employees 100% of their normal wages for the lockdown. Anything else would be simply putting low paid workers through extreme hardship to protect Blackstone’s profits.”

Their competitors have acted to make sure their workers knew what was going on before the lockdown.

• Restaurant Brands are paying all staff 100% of their average earnings over the past 4 weeks. They can afford it as well but good on them for doing the right thing.
• McDonalds are paying 80% of average earnings over the past 4 weeks. While we think it should be 100%, we need to give them credit for consulting with us, getting on top of the situation early and communicating well with their employees.
• We have an interim solution from Wendys for the next two weeks and are waiting for what will happen after that.

Burger King, on the other hand, have given no indication of what they will be doing.

"They just need to commit to taking up the government subsidy and keeping their employees. No employer knows exactly how much it will cost them, but most have made the decisions they need to anyway. Burger King can absolutely afford to do the right thing.”

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