00:00 [Music]
00:06 - No to Spain! - No!
00:07 - No to Spain! - No!
00:09 - When I say test...
00:10 - Jingle bells, virgin hotels, give us back our place!
00:15 [Cheering]
00:18 - My name's Brian Simpson, I'm the lead organiser for Unite Hospitality.
00:22 So yesterday our members, 134 workers, were taken into a meeting with the CEO of Virgin Hotel
00:28 who'd flown in from Miami to inform them that the hotel behind us was closing with immediate effect
00:34 and that they were effectively out of a job.
00:36 There was rumours but the company was never clear about what was actually happening.
00:40 So yesterday is the first time that our members verbally have been told that the hotel was closing
00:45 but the workers behind me haven't even been told 24 hours later what is actually happening.
00:50 They've not been told whether or not they're going to receive their wages.
00:53 They've not been told whether or not they have actually been terminated.
00:57 All they've been told is that the hotel is closing with immediate effect.
01:00 The workers behind me thought they were in a secure job.
01:03 The hotel's only been open for four months so they assumed that they were going to be
01:07 going through Christmas, working quite hard through Christmas, collecting a lot of tips and service charge
01:11 and here we are five days before Christmas and the workers don't know if they're even going to receive a wage.
01:16 There's a lot of anger as you can hear behind me.
01:19 They're confused about what's actually happening.
01:22 I've represented hotel workers for over ten years.
01:24 I've represented some of the most unscrupulous employers in Britain.
01:28 I have never seen anything like this.
01:30 To terminate people six days before Christmas, to tell them that their workplace is closing
01:35 and then to not even give them the clarity of a termination notice or tell them exactly how they're going to be paid.
01:41 I've never seen anything like this. It's completely outrageous.
01:44 So we're about to sit in a room with them virtually at four o'clock where we'll be meeting the senior management of the employer
01:50 and our message is quite clear. These workers deserve to be paid.
01:54 First of all they need clarity about what's actually happening with their jobs.
01:57 Secondly they need to be paid their wages.
01:59 They need to be paid the thousands of pounds in service charge and tips that's been gathered and they haven't been paid.
02:04 They also need the notice paid.
02:06 So these workers should have got a 45 days notice for the termination.
02:09 They weren't given any notice.
02:11 So they need that money and then if they're not going to pay that, they are entitled to up to three months wages
02:16 and what's called a protective award. That is where a company goes under and they don't give them 45 days notice.
02:22 The workers behind me, our members, are due up to 13 weeks wages for a protective award.
02:28 They haven't put their arms around them. In fact they've pushed them out the door.
02:32 Some of our members were escorted out the building yesterday after being informed that they'd lost their jobs.
02:37 So I'm Natalia King. I was a bartender at Virgin Hotels.
02:40 Last week we were told our jobs were safe.
02:43 Last week we were told, I know multiple people had jobs lined up thinking that something was going on
02:48 and we were told not to take those offers, not to take those jobs, that Virgin Hotels was safe.
02:53 Yesterday we got pulled into a meeting, very short notice, we only got the email the day before
02:58 and we were told our jobs were done.
03:01 As the hotel was closing its doors that day, we were all to be out of the building.
03:05 They couldn't answer us about pay, they couldn't answer us about P45s, they couldn't answer us about anything really.
03:12 We were all kind of upset. I know a lot of people were crying.
03:17 My manager Kelly, who's wonderful, was holding her giggle up because she was crying that hard she couldn't stand anymore
03:22 because she didn't know how she was going to pay her bills.
03:24 She didn't know how she was going to pay for her kids' Christmas.
03:27 It's five days to Christmas now and a lot of people don't know where they're getting money.
03:33 We all had just enough money to last us through. We were thinking we were getting paid and now we don't know.
03:38 We thought we were just going to get a new owner.
03:41 We thought that Virgin would make a good enough offer that the owners would sell.
03:47 And then we found out that the owners were going into liquidation and that the hotel had to cease operations.
03:52 That they had to stop all operations, stop all trading and that the jobs that we had were no longer.
03:59 That we were just to go home.
04:02 Everybody was crying. It was a very emotional day. Everybody was howling.
04:08 People were distraught, people were angry because whenever we had a question for the CEO of Virgin, they did not have an answer.
04:18 The staff were angry but mostly the staff were upset.
04:21 It's literally the week of Christmas and we don't have a job anymore.
04:28 Plus Vitality is just recovering from Covid.
04:31 We all thought that this was a surefire bet, that Virgin is a big enough brand that this would never have happened.
04:38 And instead, four months in, almost to the day, we don't have a job.
04:44 A lot of us opened that hotel. A lot of us were there from the start.
04:47 And we just had to leave.
04:51 We were told to collect our personal belongings in black bags today.
04:55 Give us our wage. Give us our severance. Give us our tips.
04:59 Explain yourselves. Why did you not take Virgin's offer?
05:04 I know myself personally, I turned down a different job offer for this job offer.
05:09 To come work for Virgin because I liked the brand.
05:13 I liked what they stood for. They stood for trying to change the industry.
05:16 But so far, they've not changed the industry. Not here at least, not in Glasgow.
05:20 So far all they've done is make people jobless. Possibly homeless because how are people going to pay their rent?
05:25 How are people going to pay their mortgage?
05:27 The hospitality industry has really pulled together. There's a lot of messages on Facebook.
05:31 Sorry. Just being like, "If you need a job, we have some openings, but no one is as big as this, so they can't take us all."
05:39 Hi, I'm Andy Thompson. I work as a sous-chef at the Virgin Hotels here in Glasgow.
05:43 We were working on Monday and so I broke in the press that the hotel was not being bought by Virgin
05:50 and that all our jobs were gone overnight.
05:53 We got told on Tuesday morning that the hotel was closing and there was no more work for us.
05:58 There were some Chinese whispers. It looked like there were secret meetings happening inside the hotel.
06:02 Heads of departments talking in hushed voices, but some of it broke to the staff and then two and two was put together.
06:10 My first inkling of the serious issue, I was in the kitchen working and we saw articles go up on the media online
06:17 saying that it was in dire straits. The management on site couldn't give us any answers at the time.
06:24 They called us in for a meeting yesterday morning, but just at short notice.
06:29 People didn't know what it was about. People were showing up for work to be sat down and told there wouldn't be work.
06:34 The doors were getting locked in a very tense meeting yesterday morning.
06:39 They sent us an email saying they would try and ensure that we're paid the hours that we've worked,
06:44 but nothing concrete and nothing set in stone.
06:46 I think when it opened it was seen as a huge opportunity, this hotel.
06:49 A big multinational, global company opening a hotel was an exciting prospect.
06:53 They wanted to do the best in food, have the best rooms, have it all looking nice.
06:57 So as you said, people did leave jobs to come and work at Virgin and they've been sold up forever.
07:03 Where does it leave you?
07:04 It leaves me writing a CV a few days before Christmas again.
07:07 The wee ones presents are bought, so you'll still get this Christmas, but into the new year it's going to be pretty tough.
07:12 I think times have been tough for hospitality since Covid.
07:16 We all know it's been a case of one thing after the next,
07:19 but it's definitely a shock still that it's happened so quickly without warning.
07:23 People are gutted, upset. There's a lot of anger, confusion.
07:27 A lot of our staff who maybe aren't English first speakers are sort of lost in what's happening.
07:33 It's not been properly communicated at all and everyone's a bit upset and angry
07:38 and wants to know what they're doing, what they're getting.
07:41 I suppose the best case scenario is we're paid for the work done and they honour the notice period that's in our contracts.
07:47 [Music plays]
07:53 [BLANK_AUDIO]
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