Need advice about disruptive, bullying work colleague

Miop

Hi
Long story...

Got a cleaning job locally where my husband and son are already working. Husband is a cleaner. I was self-employed for a long time and had no recent work history or references, so I figured it would be a good way to get back into the workplace, and needed something stress-free after a bit of a breakdown.

The reason the job came up was because nine cleaners had left the job within a year - none of them could work with one person (in a team of three). The contractor claimed that they did not know why these cleaners had all left (and with hindsight, I guess it's because they all just walked off the job and never saw them again...)
The person had been TUPE'd to this contractor and because he was previously a supervisor on a higher wage, he kept this higher wage and job title, even though in the new contractor, there are no supervisors and everyone else is in NMW. He also had 3.5 hours a day compared to everyone else's 2 hours.
Basically he is a lazy person who wants the job for the money, but to do no work, but because he was titled 'supervisor', he behaves like a manager, delegating jobs and then doing as little as possible himself. He had pushed the previous cleaners around (including my husband, who had learned to say 'no' to him after a while), and he tried it with me but after a few weeks I also said no. I was asked to say why I thought the cleaners had left (they were all women and he is a 60 year old man, so they thought maybe something sinister was going on...) and I told them. The problem was that there was no routine and the two cleaners were being ordered around by this man while he would just push a buffer around for hours.
After this, the area supervisor (a Polish chap) issued some 'Next Steps' (NS) delegating certain jobs to each of us. As it's a retail store, we had to get the shop floor done by 9am and as he got the extra 1.5 hours, he had to clean the toilets and back areas.
To try to cut a long story short, he refused - he continued to do what he was doing and tried to order us around still, but we refused and did as the NS said. He got more and more frustrated and tried to disrupt what we were doing (buffing dirty floors etc.), didn't bother with his post 9am jobs, and would leave us bullying notes telling us our work was not good enough and lists of jobs for us (particularly the toilets, which he doesn't like doing). He then told the Polish area supervisor that he was not taking orders from a younger man who was also a foreigner, and signed a statement to that effect. Nothing happened. The area supervisor and manager seemed to just abandon us after that (never coming to site, or not coming when we were there). We just stuck to what we were doing, and even the store manager asked him if he was sticking to the NS and he said no, because he didn't agree with it.
I couldn't take any more of his aggression and had several days off (unpaid) when I just couldn't face him, so I wrote a letter of complaint, but the day I was going to post it, he was outside the building crying his eyes out. Evidently he has some kind of problem. Stupidly, I took pity on him and we tried to talk to him. He told us he had panic attacks and apologised for his behaviour. Within minutes he was trying to persuade one of us to do the toilets, but as he gets the extra hours and money, we refused. We would not be able to get our shop floor jobs done in time. So we just carried on, but then his hours were cut to the same as ours. Some new NS were pinned to the wall for him by supervisor (that his areas were filthy) but he just ignored them. Now we have had our hours cut also and we have to do an extra job, and he is refusing to do anything but buff the floors.
The supervisor finally came in last week to talk to us and told the man he was not doing his job properly and would have to do it all in the time allotted. The day after, the man texted me at 6am saying he was 'feeling aggressive' and hoped I understood, so I had another unpaid day off. He has produced a doctor's note to say he is claustrophobic and cannot do the toilets but he isn't doing anything much else either except buffing, as he has always done. I have told the supervisor this but he just says 'it takes time'. We have not been told to do his areas so they are just being left and getting dirtier and dirtier.
We are having to carry him when he gets more money and is taking the pee - how can you be a cleaner if you 'can't clean toilets' and he has done them for the past three years? How can he be claustrophobic when he spent half his time standing in the tiny cleaning cupboard reading the paper? How can you be aggressive to work colleagues and get away with it?
I understand this man has more employment rights than us as he has been there three years (including cleaning toilets...), but surely he has now done enough to get the push? I don't get it.
Why don't I leave? Well apart from the fact that I don't think he should be allowed to bully people out of their jobs, I need the money and I like the job and can't find another one! I know it's only a cleaning job but I really need it.
I just don't know how to handle it now, and I don't understand why they don't just sack him.
How does the law stand on this? What would my employer have to do to get rid of him, or how badly would he have to behave to be sacked? Is it just a case of an incompetent employer which doesn't know how to handle this?
Any advice gratefully received...

pmlindyloo

As with most things in the work place there is a procedure to deal with such problems.

Since you have already spoken to your supervisor about this and little has been done then you need to raise a written grievance.

Have you got a hand book which sets out the procedure?

if you are a member of a trades union they would be able to help you with this.

If not, then have a thorough read of this:

http://www.adviceguide.org.uk/england/work_e/work_problems_at_work_e/dealing_with_grievances_at_work.htm

and act accordingly.