Lucy Devine
An Austin City Council meeting was interrupted when YouTube Music staff were laid off halfway through.
During the meeting, which took place on Thursday (February 29) the workers from YouTube Music were commenting on a proposed resolution.
The meeting came after they had been negotiating with Google and subcontractor Cognizant, to receive better pay as well as job security.
Advert
The staff members have been protesting against the company for the past year, with issues over pay, job security and company benefits.
They have also been protesting a return to office policy that was introduced in 2023.
In the meeting, council member Zo Qadri called on Google - the parent company of YouTube Music, as well as Cognizant to enter into negotiations with the group of workers.
But halfway through, the staff members were laid off by the business.
You can watch the moment below:
One of the team had been commenting on the resolution when another staff member interrupted to tell him that the entire team would be losing their jobs.
"Sorry to interrupt but they just laid us all off," said the worker.
"Our jobs are ended today, effective immediately."
Meanwhile, the man speaking added: "Wow."
Some staff members then left the meeting to go to the company's office and retrieve their belongings.
Following the meeting, Google said the layoffs were planned as contracts were due to end at this time.
Google communications manager Bailey Tomson wrote: “As we’ve shared before, these are not Google employees.
"Cognizant is responsible for these workers’ employment terms, including staffing. As is the case here, contracts with our suppliers across the company routinely end on their natural expiry date, which was agreed to with Cognizant.”
But council members have been critical of the move.
“Austin is a union city, and as the sponsor of this resolution, I will always stand with labor. What happened today was unconscionable,” Zo Qadri wrote.
“The Austin-based YouTube Music Content Operations Team had voted unanimously in favor of unionization in an NLRB sanctioned union election, and those workers had been waiting for good faith negotiations with their employers ever since.
"In the meantime, those workers were paid below living wage in Austin, despite working for a multi-billion dollar Fortune 100 company. And now, without warning, they’ve lost their jobs. The Alphabet Workers Union-CWA has my full support.”
UNILAD has reached to Cognizant and Google for further comment.