"Rockstar has tried to get away with Grand Theft Employment Rights" - Final hearing in Rockstar vs. GTA 6 fired employees begins this week
Two weeks after Grand Theft Auto 6's Netflix reveal, and only a couple of months before the game's release, Rockstar Games has an employment tribunal to fight. This week, the final hearing in Rockstar vs. the 31 fired Rockstar North employees begins.
Overview
Two weeks after Grand Theft Auto 6's Netflix reveal, and only a couple of months before the game's release, Rockstar Games has an employment tribunal to fight. The final hearing in Rockstar vs. the 31 fired Rockstar North employees begins Thursday 10th September and runs through to 16th October.
Rockstar must face allegations that it "unlawfully" fired those 31 employees and "blacklisted" them for union membership — claims brought by the Independent Workers Union of Great Britain (IWGB). Rockstar tried to have the claims thrown out earlier this year, but the employment tribunal ruled against it.
Rockstar fired 34 employees in October last year — 31 of them at Rockstar North in Scotland — for alleged "gross misconduct", saying they breached confidentiality agreements by talking about the company in a private IWGB Discord channel. The employees maintain they were discussing salaries and HR issues. The IWGB seeks reinstatement or compensation, "as well as a finding from the tribunal that their dismissals were unfair".
Ahead of the hearing, IWGB president Alex Marshall said: "We believe Rockstar has tried to get away with Grand Theft Employment Rights." Former Rockstar employee Jason Lewis added: "For almost a year, the truth about what happened to us has been buried by Rockstar... Now we finally get the chance to put it on the record."