On Tuesday 23 April, far-right groups descended on the capital to attend a St George’s Day rally led by former EDL leader Tommy Robinson and Laurence Fox. The day itself would quickly descend into chaos, with the Met reporting that groups of men carrying flags had ‘forced their way through’ police cordons an hour before the event was due to take place. Glass bottles were thrown, scores were injured and a police horse was hit. By the end of the event, ten people had been arrested.
As chaos raged in central London, Myriam* headed to her job at BrewDog’s flagship bar in Waterloo, completely unaware of the fighting taking place just over a mile away. As she exited the subway, she saw a message in the internal staff chat. “Please tell me it is not true that we are organizing the EDL today,” said one of her colleagues. Myriam, an Asian woman, was shocked. “It can’t be true,” she said to herself as she walked to work.
‘As I was about to go in, three EDL members walked out with large flags and looked at me from the side. And I thought, “Oh God, it’s true. They are really here,” she says Stand. “I came in and asked the staff, ‘Are you okay with this?’ and they said, “No. This is crazy.”
Myriam went to the general manager’s office, horrified and shocked by what she had seen. ‘I asked him what the hell was going on: “Why are we organizing the EDL?” and he said, ‘We don’t host them. They’re just having a meeting.’” Visibly emotional, with tears in her eyes, she was desperate. ‘I said, ‘I don’t understand this. This is fucking incredible.” I also asked if he would accept the BNP having a meeting here.”
Myriam sent a message to the manager that evening to apologize. “I said, ‘I’m sorry if my emotions were too much, but put yourself in the shoes of a brown woman in this situation.’ I explained that my family had experienced racist abuse from the EDL when I was growing up and that I had been very triggered by the experience of being surrounded by such a large number of them.’
In documents seen by StandBrewDog accused Myriam of ‘aggressive and insulting behavior’.
“This was not the case at all,” Myriam claims. “All I said was, ‘I can’t fucking believe this. This is fucking incredible.” I didn’t swear at my manager.’
‘When I read the accusation, it completely broke me. I was scared, angry, heartbroken. I felt powerless. This is my job. I have bills to pay. I had a breakdown.’
“They fired me regardless of the truth. I came to the manager’s office to explain that, as a brown girl, I felt very uncomfortable with the EDL’s presence. They were allowed to sit there and drink before their meeting, which always turned violent.‘
BrewDog, she says, was ignorant of the concerns of people of color. ‘The person who conducted my disciplinary meeting didn’t even know who the EDL were. He said he’d never been to London before, so he didn’t really know.’
“It didn’t make sense. My managers curse all the time. They’re comfortable with each other. I didn’t curse at my manager. It was such a stressful situation. They fired me because of it. It was heartbreaking because I’ve worked there for so many years. I’ve put so much time and energy into it and always tried to make the place better.”
Myriam says her colleagues felt extremely uncomfortable about the situation. ‘One of my colleagues told me that the situation brought them to tears. One of them indicated that he no longer wanted to be part of the company. A third described how she was told that because she was melanized she could tolerate spicy food.’
This isn’t the first time BrewDog staff has raised concerns. At the end of March, an open letter from disgruntled employees at BrewDog Waterloo claimed they had been going through a ‘horrific’ time due to ‘poor’ management practices. The allegations included claims of “bullying and gaslighting,” with employees reporting having to “endure racism, sexism and ableism.” It followed a previous open letter published in June 2021, signed by 61 former staff, which made similar claims about workplace practices.
“I don’t want anything to do with BrewDog anymore,” says Myriam. ‘It’s so tiring to work there. It took so much energy that I didn’t even realize how much happier I would be somewhere other than BrewDog.’
“BrewDog has a history of treating its employees with contempt, but firing an employee of color for objecting to members of a fascist organization meeting in their workplace is a new low for this company,” said Bryan Simpson, lead organizer at Unite Hospitality.
‘This example may be particularly shocking, but it is part of a flood of serious complaints we have received about the treatment of workers at Waterloo BrewDog, from a toxic culture of management bullying and unfair dismissals to shocking health and safety breaches. We will do everything we can at both the legal and industrial levels to ensure our members get the justice they deserve at this and every BrewDog.’