30 Twitter employees in Germany have been fired as part of a sweeping attack by new Twitter owner Elon Musk. Now they are acting together with Verdi. There is also a class action lawsuit in the United States.
According to Verdi, employees of Twitter Germany GmbH received their notice of dismissal by email on Nov. 4, the post followed on Nov. 16, apparently worldwide. The area of software development is especially striking, even at a global level: this is what an interested person told the union, who prefers to remain anonymous. Exchange ideas with employees from all over the world.
There is even one in the US Class action lawsuit in the Northern District of California been presented. There would be other employee protections there, but not any — as Musk’s behavior might suggest, according to Verdi. Musk would then have had to announce the termination in writing 60 days in advance. Instead, some employees simply lost access to their work and office accounts. There are fines of up to $30,000 for each missing notice. However, some employees have received severance pay or are still receiving wages even though they were made redundant.
Protection against dismissal and works council on Twitter
In Germany, legal actions are underway to protect against unfair dismissal. Verdi supports those affected. Typically, this leads to conciliation proceedings which end in a settlement – or there is a hearing in which the legality of the dismissals is decided.
Those affected, who have joined Verdi, also want to set up a works council. Therefore, so says Verdi’s statement: “Even if they ultimately won’t stay with the company, at least their colleagues who do stay should be better protected from further hasty coups from Elon Musk in the future.” The employees are supported by Hikmat El-Hammouri in establishing the works council. He has already supported the establishment of a works council in Tiktok.
It is not known how many employees Twitter had in Germany and still have. The company’s offices in Hamburg and Berlin closed years ago, but there’s still an address in Berlin and desks are said to have been rented out in co-working spaces. The anonymous impressed by Verdi also reports that he worked almost exclusively in the home office. An online heise inquiry about this has not yet been answered.
(emw)
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