Five McDonald's employees have filed a lawsuit against their employer for not providing a safe work environment.
A number of McDonald's employees based in Chicago, USA, have filed a class action lawsuit against giant fast-food chain, alleging that the company is not providing adequate protection against Covid-19. According to Reuters, the lawsuit does not seek financial composition for staff or family that has subsequently fallen ill but rather employees are demanding that the company comply with health and safety requirements for such as providing clean face masks.
The employees have alleged, among other things, that McDonald's managers told workers to reuse gloves and told them that there was no need for social distancing if they restricted contact with others to less than 10 minutes.
McDonald's has since responded to claims made by the employees, denying that it had not provided adequate protective gear, which they insisted was “is in ample supply for all restaurants; masks, gloves and protective barriers are required at all restaurants; (and) to date, more than 100 million masks have been distributed to crew.”
Reads the statement:
“Crew and managers are the heart and soul of the restaurants in which they work, and their safety and well-being is a top priority that guides our decision making…Since February, McDonald's USA has updated nearly 50 processes to keep restaurant employees and customers safe and has issued a 59-page guide outlining national standards restaurants must implement. These include wellness checks, protective barriers, adhering to social distancing guidelines for customers and crew, using gloves and masks, increasing the frequency of handwashing and moving to contactless operations.”
