It is not an issue that management takes seriously enough,Cate says. If we used our grievance procedures to complain about bullying we would get laughed at. The union is looking at a model agreement that London kitchen staff for upscale hotels and restaurants lik the Ritz, Claridges and Planet Hollywood, have developed with their union. In Tasmania people prefer to put up with it because there is no alternative jobs. The bullying may actually be illegal but in this town if anything went to court your name would be mud and you wouldn't get another job.
Management lives off that.
The last two and a half years she's been one of the two LHMU Kitchen delegates. When the staff recently started collecting evidence about a particular OHS problem they wanted rectified a new wave of bullying spread through the workplace. Hotel kitchens can be tough places to work. They can also be the scene of workplace bullying and intimidation. It sounds silly but it can be sometimes just like the old schoolyard.