28,000 Call for Replacement of WestJet CEO Over Mishandling of Sexaul Assault Cases

May 03, 2016

Over 28,000 Call for Replacement of WestJet CEO Gregg Saretsky Over Mishandling of Sexaul Assault Cases

SumOfUs to Deliver Shareholder Letter at WestJet Annual General Meeting in Calgary

CALGARY — On Tuesday, May 3rd, as WestJet shareholders gather for the the airline's Annual General Meeting, Emma Pullman, lead campaign strategist at SumOfUs, will be on-the-ground to ask questions and appeal to shareholders to vote against reappointing CEO Gregg Saretsky over his failure to prevent and adequately respond to sexual assault against WestJet flight attendants. She will also deliver a letter from shareholders calling on WestJet’s Board Chair and Safety Health and Environment Committee Chair to replace Saretsky.

The letter, addressed to Clive Beddoe, Chair of the Board, S Barry Jackson, Chair of the Safety, Health and Environment Committees and Barbara Munroe, Corporate Secretary, is being circulated to over 300 WestJet shareholders who have called on Saretsky to resign.

Since news of the assaults broke, more than 28,000 Canadian members of SumOfUs, an international corporate watchdog group, have signed onto a petition calling for CEO Gregg Saretsky to step down, and for the company to institute a comprehensive overhaul of their sexual harassment and assault prevention and reporting procedures. Of the 28,000 Canadians who have signed the SumOfUs petition, over 2,200 are frequent flyers, and 15,000 are WestJet customers.

VIEW A FULL COPY OF THE LETTER HERE: https://actions.sumofus.org/a/sign-onto-the-westjet-letter-from-shareholders

VIEW THE PETITION HERE: https://actions.sumofus.org/a/west-jet-whistleblower

The campaign comes after a lawsuit was filed in the B.C. Supreme Court on March 1, 2016 in which the plaintiff in the suit, Mandalena Lewis, a flight attendant at WestJet from 2008 to 2016, claimed that WestJet failed to investigate or respond to her report of a sexual assault by a WestJet pilot. WestJet took away the pilot's ability to fly to the location where the assault took place, ostensibly taking away the ability of local authorities to prosecute the assault.

Since Lewis filed her lawsuit in early March, at least eight additional WestJet employees have come forward claiming they had also been sexual assaulted by WestJet employees and that the airline failed to take action to prosecute their attackers and prevent further sexual assaults.