Outsourcing

     The people... united... will never be defeated! If this is true, then conversely, The people... divided... are like lambs before the slaughter of  any organisation with the will to exploit them.

     I was appalled on Sunday to hear  the story of Dave Moreau, slated to lose his I.T. job with The Royal Bank to a worker brought in from India to replace him. To add insult to injury, he was being required to train his replacement!  It seems that he is just one of 45 working Canadians being subjected to this indignity by a so-called Canadian corporation operating under a charter from our federal government.  In viewing a segment on this issue on CBC news tonight it would appear that other chartered banks are doing the same thing to varying degrees.

     What a difference a few days makes.  As of Thursday, the CEO of the Royal Bank had issued a public statement of apology. As a letter of apology it is pretty lame. On CTV's Canada AM Geoff Rowan of Ketchum Public Relations Canada said, " So would it be wrong for me to say blah blah blah? This is a typical lawyers letter that was written with the lawyers standing over top of the p.r. people."   It's  kind of telling that a guy in the business of spin doesn't buy the sincerity of this  little piece of corporate propaganda.
     
     So where are we to go from here? We Canadians are a pretty tolerant people. On the one hand,  part of me wants to say " Ok, the guy apologized ( lame as it was ) and the people effected are going to keep their jobs or get other jobs within the system. Let's just move on.

     But I can't.  It's not enough to push a bully away. A bully has to be taken down to the extent that he will seriously question his intentions if he tries to repeat his bad behaviour. This letter of apology, carefully worded and legally couched, is at best, a minor victory for the working people of this country. It is the height of arrogance to give a worker 90 days notice and then expect him to train the poor underpaid schlemiel who will replace him! This was the intent of a    financial institution in which Canadians have entrusted their savings and finances for over a century. This was the intent of a corporation that rakes in billions of profits every year operating under a charter granted to it by the government of the people of Canada. 
  
     This letter of apology is the best work of a corporate CEO who last year took home $12.6 million in salary, bonuses and stock options. I've seen better, more heartfelt letters written by schoolchildren!


                                        ...more later