Versailles, France:
The French branch of Swedish retailing giant Ikea went on trial Monday accused of operating an elaborate method to spy on employees and job applicants applying private detectives and police officers.
Ikea France is getting prosecuted as a corporate entity along with various of its former executives in Versailles, southwest of Paris.
Journalists uncovered the surveillance scheme in 2012 and magistrates started investigating just after the Force Ouvriere (FO) union lodged a legal complaint.
Prosecutors say Ikea France collected facts on hundreds of current and potential employees, like confidential information and facts about criminal records, as component of a “spying system”.
The firm at times targeted union members and their representatives, prosecutors allege.
“This trial must set an example,” mentioned Adel Amara, a former FO union rep at an Ikea retailer.
Ikea France, which employs 10,000 persons, faces a fine of up to 3.75 million euros ($4.5 million).
The 15 persons getting attempted in the court include things like former retailer managers and best executives such as former CEO Stefan Vanoverbeke and his predecessor, Jean-Louis Baillot, who had been each present on Monday.
The group also incorporates 4 police officers accused of handing more than confidential information and facts.
The charges include things like illegally gathering individual information and facts, getting illegally gathered individual information and facts, and violating skilled confidentiality, some of which carry a maximum prison term of 10 years.
“We’re here to today to show that there are these types of actions inside companies that police trade unions and above all their employees,” a senior member of the tough-left CGT union, Amar Lagha, told reporters.
– ‘Get rid of that person’ –
Jean-Francois Paris, Ikea France’s former director of danger management, was allegedly at the heart of the method.
Prosecutors say he routinely sent lists of names to private investigators, whose combined annual bill could run up to 600,000 euros, according to court documents noticed by AFP.
The court is investigating Ikea’s practices amongst 2009 and 2012, but prosecutors say they began practically a decade earlier.
Among the targets was a employees member in Bordeaux “who used to be a model employee, but has suddenly become a protester”, according to an e mail sent by Paris.
“We want to know how that change happened,” he mentioned, questioning no matter whether there may possibly be “a risk of eco-terrorism”.
In an additional case, Paris wanted to know how an employee could afford to drive a brand-new BMW convertible.
Such messages ordinarily went to Jean-Pierre Foures, the boss of surveillance firm Eirpace.
He would then send Paris confidential information and facts, which prosecutors say he got from the police database STIC with the aid of the 4 officers.
Prosecutors say the information and facts flow may well even have gone each methods, with an internal Ikea France document recommending handing more than its report about an employee to police “to get rid of that person via a legal procedure outside the company”.
Emmanuel Daoud, a lawyer for Ikea France, rejected the spying accusations, but acknowledged that the case had revealed “organisational weaknesses”.
He mentioned the firm had considering the fact that implemented an action strategy, like a total revamp of hiring procedures.
“Whatever the court rules, the company has already been punished very severely in terms of its reputation,” he mentioned ahead of the trial.
Founded in 1943, Swedish multinational Ikea is well-known for its prepared-to-assemble furnishings, kitchen appliances and residence accessories which are sold in about 400 shops worldwide.
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