Ethics in the digital workplace
Digitisation and automation technologies, including artificial intelligence (AI), can affect working conditions in a variety of ways and their use in the workplace raises a host of new ethical concerns.
The UK-based Vaughan Engineering Ltd, which specialised in mechanical and electrical building services and had three offices in Broxburn (Scotland), Warrington and Newcastle (England), went into administration on 26th March 2018. The administrators immediately made 147 of the company’s 154 employees redundant, but the exact number of redundancies was reported on 18th May. The administrators state in their report that they are assisting employees in getting statutory redundancy pay.
The firm was the first casualty in the supply chain of Carillion, which collapsed in January 2018. When announcing going into administration, the finance director of Vaughan Engineering said that Carillion owed them £650,000 (€742,000) for completed work.
The Northern Ireland arm of the wider Vaughan Engineering Group, which employs 330 people, continues to trade as normal.
Eurofound (2018), Vaughan Engineering Ltd, Bankruptcy in United Kingdom, factsheet number 94213, European Restructuring Monitor. Dublin, https://restructuringeventsprod.azurewebsites.net/restructuring-events/detail/94213.