Pols appeal to Brooks Brothers
Ask for severance and health care for workers in wake of bankruptcy
U.S. Sen. Ed Markey, Congresswoman Lori Trahan and state and union leaders called on Brooks Brothers Sunday to provide severance pay and health insurance to more than 400 workers in the wake of its bankruptcy filings.
“These are 413 workers who have lost the security and peace of mind that comes with hard work,” Markey said of the employees of Brooks Brothers’ Southwick manufacturing facility in Haverhill, who were laid off in May. “Brooks Brothers is responsible for keeping its word to its dedicated workers. … We cannot let Brooks Brothers leave these workers out to dry. That is just plain wrong.”
The 200-year-old company, which dressed nearly every U.S. president, filed for bankruptcy protection earlier this month, the latest major clothing seller to be toppled by the coronavirus pandemic. Brooks Brothers said it will permanently close more than a quarter of its 200 stores.
In a statement Sunday, the company said: “Although Brooks Brothers does not comment specifically on confidential negotiations, it should be noted that the union leader representing Southwick employees did negotiate and sign its most recent binding Collective Bargaining Agreement — which — unlike our other two factories in … North Carolina and New York, did not include a severance provision.” “It did, however, include a provision that binds the company to pay benefits for employees, including healthcare, which have been paid throughout the pandemic while employees are on furlough,” Brooks Brothers said. “The company has fulfilled all commitments to its most recent CBA, which the union negotiated and signed.”
UNITE HERE Local 187 member Ana Rondon, who has worked at Southwick for 17 years, wonders where that leaves her.
“It’s so unjust that we wake up at 5 o’clock in the morning and then come home at 6 at night to then be treated this way,” Rondon said through a translator, state Rep. Andy Vargas, D-Haverhill.
New England Joint Board of UNITE HERE manager Warren Pepicelli said the union’s workers have done everything asked of them, including making masks to protect other people from the coronavirus, even though the workers themselves were scared to come to work.
“It is heartbreaking to think that health-care coverage is going to halt,” Trahan said in the conference call on Sunday. “This fight’s just starting.”