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RETAIL WORKERS HAVE reported an increase in the level of verbal abuse they’re receiving from shoppers in the busy period before Christmas, according to trade union Mandate.
After receiving “worrying reports” of an increase in the number of altercations with customers in recent weeks, the union — which represents around 30,000 shop workers in Ireland — is calling for greater respect for frontline workers at this time of high stress.
Mandate is also reminding employers to play their role in protecting shop workers this Christmas by ensuring that Covid guidelines are followed.
Central Statistics Office data, published in October, revealed that retail assistants, cashiers and checkout operators were the cohort of workers most likely to catch the virus during the second and third waves of the pandemic.
This was a significant shift from the early stages of the pandemic, when healthcare staff and social workers were most likely to catch the virus, making up 60% of cases among workers in April 2020.
The figures showed that in the first wave of Covid-19, as the country locked down, 6% of the total cases in workers were in nurses and midwives. That level, the data indicates, fell to 4% in the next two waves of the virus between August and November 2020 and November 2020 and May 2021.
But retail staff and checkout operators made up 6% of cases among all employees in the same time period, making them the hardest hit individual group of employees in the country.
In a statement, Mandate General Secretary Gerry Light there’s “no doubt” that they have been “impacted heavily by the current wave” of Covid-19.
“The least they deserve is a bit of patience and respect,” he said.
He added, “We have seen videos of customers verbally abusing workers in recent days. Employers must do all they can to support their staff when this happens.”
While Christmas is always a stressful time for shop workers, Light said the recent spike in case numbers is exacerbating the challenges they face in the workplace.
“We are asking customers to have heightened levels of awareness of the difficulties facing shop workers”, he said. “Abuse is not part of the job and it costs nothing to show respect and support to the workers who have kept our shelves full throughout the pandemic.”
Employers also have a role to play at this busy time, he said.
Light added, “Employers need to ensure that Covid guidelines are adhered to in order to protect the health of their staff and the public principally by ensuring that shop workers are not put in the firing line by requesting customers to wear masks or to social distance.
“It is the employer’s responsibility to ensure there is adequate hand sanitiser and that there are no overcrowding issues.”
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More natural forests are needed
Instead of plastic ones.
Are they talking about forests or the sterile non-native conifer plantations which blight our landscape and threaten the survival of species such as Hen Harrier? Judging the reasoning behind the groups in question I’m reckoning they’re talking about the plantations rather than native or semi-natural woodlands rich in biodiversity.
Special branch should look into this.
i think they are on leave at the moment
Its not the number of trees being planted but how bio diverse the forests are. Acres of conifer plantations do more environmental harm than good
especially to rivers, the massive amounts of sulfer put in the soil runs off and drops the Ph of rivers ruining spawning grounds
Here we go, a report to soften us up for the privitisation of Coillte, the largest single landowner in the State
Sounds about right.
That’s a great pic of lough Tay in county Wicklow. A member of the Guinness family has a wonderful house down there, although he may have passed away. I have cycled and hiked over these Wicklow mountains and really feel that they should be covered in forests. This land was covered at one time with oak and other trees. The govt needs to get the finger out and start to increase Irish woodlands. If you leave the land alone the trees will come back naturally.
Jim Jameson
Why would you need to be softened up for a Government sale of the collet harvesting rights? Have you seen the appalling Annual Reports over the last few years?
In 2011 they had sales of 259 m and only managed a profit of 19.9m and this is with free land a story wen a massive one million acres.
Worse than this their pension fund has a shortfall of nearly a hundred million Euro. How do you manage that trick with just one thousand employees? The answer is simple ……..make it a publicly owned enterprise and they’ll just milk it for all it’s worth.
See the harvesting rights for up to two billion and let someone else do the real job of managing the business as that clearly hasn’t been done for some time.
We get to keep the land. We get money for new investment in the economy and the workers get their pension funds fixed.
With proper management exports will increase and the State will accrue further profit taxes.
Simple.
….sell the harvesting rights….. Mea culpa
have your say