A company which last week was accused of firing an employee because she was pregnant, today denied the accusation and insisted that she was sacked because she failed her duties.
Christine Bonnici last Friday filed a judicial protest against BDO Attard Buttigieg Psaila and Co claiming her job was terminated after she informed the company that she was pregnant.
But in a counter protest this morning, the company insisted the pregnancy was irrelevant to her dismissal. The employee, they said, failed to honour her contract of employment in which she bound herself to devote the whole working time to the services of the employer.
Ms Bonnici, the company said, joined its workforce on February 9. She was obliged to sign a confidentiality statement due to the highly sensitive and confidential nature of her job, which included preparing and supervising the transfer of considerable amounts of money on behalf of partners.
In the confidentiality statement, she was asked whether she was ever bankrupt, in debt or had compromising arrangements with creditors, questions to which she replied in the negative.
During probationary routine checks which formed part of her performance review, the company found that Ms Bonnici had sent several e-mails of a personal and commercial nature using the office server. These revealed that she was running her personal interior design company during her working hours, using the e-mail facilities belonging to the company.
Such actions created serious doubts about her attitude towards the company. She also failed to inform the company that the court had ordered the sale by auction of her apartment following an official request by HSBC.
Ms Bonnici had not replied truthfully to these questions because she knew that this information would disqualify her from the job, the company claimed.
It said that Ms Bonnici had identified Chris Cachia as her partner and the first person to be informed in case of an emergency.
The company carried out a check on him and found out that he was no longer authorised by the MFSA to operate as an insurance sub-agent.
Their research also found that banks and businesses had filed cases to recover over €125,000 from Mr Cachia.
The company said that on July 27, Ms Bonnici informed director John Attard that she would continue working after having the baby but that she would need help because the baby was too young to be left alone. She also informed the company that she was thinking of taking 13 weeks maternity leave.
The decision not to retain Ms Bonnici beyond her probation period had already been taken by that time and her pregnancy was not a factor, the company said.
In added that in over 30 years of operation, it had never dismissed pregnant employees, and there were women in senior positions represented 48 percent of its employees.