MHI staff muzzled, threatened with termination

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This article was published 25/09/2020 (1455 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

Staff at Manitoba Hydro International concerned about their future at the Hydro subsidiary after they were told to stop seeking new business are now being threatened with dismissal for speaking to the media.

Over the past couple of weeks the Free Press and other media have received leaked internal documents that detailed to staff what sort of new work they are allowed to accept from potential clients.

Very specifically, the memo said they are not to “aggressively pursue new work” up until Oct. 7, all new work must include a clause that would allow MHI to terminate work with no more than 90 days’ notice without penalty and all work must have an end date no later than Dec. 31, 2021.

This week it was reported that Manitoba Hydro’s board of directors held an emergency meeting that NDP Hydro critic, Adrien Sala said was “very likely” to discuss the future of Manitoba Hydro International. Manitoba Hydro officials have not confirmed that board meeting actually took place on Thursday.

On Friday, a day after that board meeting — details of what was discussed are unknown at this time — MHI employees were called for an “all-hands” meeting.

As one staffer, who asked not to be named, said, “We expected the all-hands meeting today to be discussing the results of the board meeting yesterday, but instead it was a full-on assault on MHI employees for leaking.”

MHI managers read letters from senior Manitoba Hydro human resource department officials warning MHI employees that if they continued to speak to the press and to government officials, that they would be fired.

Copies of the letters were not made available to staff, but were read out loud, apparently so there would not be hard copies or digital versions that could be distributed outside the office.

martin.cash@freepress.mb.ca