NUBE expels bank affiliate

A national federation sought the expulsion of a local affiliate union from its ranks before the officers of an affiliate union would be able to finalize its collective bargaining agreement (CBA) with their management counterparts.

The controversy involves the National Union of Bank Employees (NUBE), a federation of bank unions in the Philippines, and the NUBE affiliate at the Hong Kong Shanghai Bank or NUBE-HSBC. In a press statement, NUBE finds the CBA package agreed upon by the HSBC and the NUBE-HSBC "unacceptable" because the provisions are "low and inferior" in comparison with the recent award given by the Secretary of Labor and Employment in the CBA deadlock case of Standard Chartered Bank and with the recently-concluded CBA at the Citibank.

The Standard Chartered Bank employees got a 30-percent salary increase spread over three years, while the Citibank employees got a whopping 33-percent for a similar three-year period.

On the other hand, the HSBC offer, which was accepted by the NUBE-HSBC officers, was only 21-percent for three years, supplemented by an annual four percent performance-based wage increase. All three banks are foreign-owned.

"NUBE finds the package highly questionable given the higher profitability of HSBC compared to the two other banks and also given the fact that HSBC had no effective CBA since 1993 as a result of a prolonged strike by employees over the implementation of a job evaluation program which sought to lower the entry wage of new workers by almost one half of the existing practice," it said.

The 1993-96 strike led to the separation from HSBC of close to 200 employees. Last year, a certification election was ordered by the Secretary of Labor, which paved the way for the recognition of the NUBE affiliate.

NUBE said the mid-year bonus and other benefits offered by HSBC management is inferior to those of Standard Chartered and Citibank. When the officers of NUBE-HSBC decided to accept the management offer over the objection of NUBE, the latter decided to expel the former on the basis of NUBE’s principles, foremost of which is to deliver an above-standard CBA in favor of the rank-and-file employees.

The NUBE Resolution expelling NUBE-Hong Kong Bank Employees Chapter was unanimously approved by its National Board of Directors last October 4, 2001.