Almost DKK 3 million to the Poles
With the assistance from the union, 27 Polish construction workers have been admitted and paid DKK 2.8 million in salary demands as their employer failed to pay the bill and closed down the business.
Signatures had to be given and inspection had to be made, before the many cheques were handed out. Here Tomasz Patro is standing between the union employees Kim Kristensen and Marcin Nowakowski. (Photo: Harry Nielsen)
This is what the 27 Polish construction workers have just been paid by Lønmodtagernes Garantifond (LG).
The payments are a result of them joining a Danish union in June, who uncovered substantial salary cheating.
Things were lively at the big bookkeeping office when the 27 Polish each received a check of the outstanding amount. This took place at 3F Frederiksborg in Hillerød, who has raised a claim against LG.
- Without the union, we would not have received a single Danish krone. We might as well just admit it. We do not know the Danish regulations and we would never have been able to take legal action on our own.
These were the words of a very satisfied Krzysztof Sobierce, a 22-year-old construction worker from the Krakow-area in southern Poland. During the first 6 months of 2007, he and other countrymen were employed by the construction firm Bo Bedre Aps at a subsidized house building in Helsinge.
Krzysztof Sobierce and his colleagues were however cheated. The employer simply did not comply with the agreement, which the firm was subject to through its membership of Dansk Byggeri. Both the firm and Dansk Byggeri had to acknowledge this at a mediation meeting, which took place at the end of July. Four days after the mediation meeting, the Poles were given a dismissal notice, after which the firm failed to pay the outstanding amount which had been admitted, as well as the last three weeks of employment by filing for bankruptcy.
Gross cheating
Since then, 3F Frederiksborg has on behalf of the 27 members computed the claim which totally amounts to DKK 2.8 million. The amount after tax deduction is DKK 2.1 million – or an average of more than DKK 75.000 to each one of them.
And it was this large amount of money, which Kim Kristensen, the union secretary of 3F Frederiksborg, with the assistance from Marcin Nowakowski, BAT’s Polish speaking union employee, disbursed.
In addition to the outstanding salary, the holiday allowance was also lacking, as well as public holiday allowance and contribution to pension fond. Regarding the holiday allowance and the pension, the Polish workers were only paid if they no longer have an address in Denmark.
- The total amount shows the level of gross cheating, which the Polish workers were subject to, Kim Kristensen says.
He states that the reason why the union was able to prove the extent of the cheating to LG, was due to the fact that the Poles had kept exact accounts of the days they had been working.
- If we are to receive money from LG, it is important that each employee has kept exact accounts of where they have been working and when they have been working as well as saving all documentation from the employer, not least the pay slips, he says.
Some of the Poles had planned to party a little in Copenhagen with the large sum of money.
However, the money was paid in crossed cheques which need to go through the bank first. And even though many of the Poles still have a bank account in Denmark, they were unable to cash the cheques right away. They have to stay on a Danish bank account for three days, before the money can be withdrawn.