Shell weighs vaccine mandate and firing staff who resist

Shell weighs vaccine mandate and firing staff who resist

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Royal Dutch Shell is weighing whether to mandate vaccines for employees and fire those who refuse to comply, according to an internal memo sent to the oil supermajor’s executive committee.

The document, dated September 1, outlined a case for “selective vaccine mandates” initially at offshore and other remote locations where staff live and work and where other criteria were met, including the availability of World Health Organization-approved vaccines.

Employees in other parts of the business could be subject to mandatory vaccination “over time”, the memo said.

“For staff who refuse to comply with a vaccine mandate we would make all reasonable efforts to avoid terminating their employment but will be faced with no alternative but to do so,” the document said.

Some of the world’s largest employers are wrestling with corporate vaccine policy in the face of surging cases of the Delta coronavirus variant, uneven access to vaccines around the world and resistance to jabs in some countries.

Last month, US oil producers Hess and Chevron said they would require some of their employees, including those working offshore in the Gulf of Mexico, to be vaccinated against the coronavirus.

The investment