not allowing cell phones at work

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I assume the company has tried to make a no calls during work hours policy work? That would surely be a first step before a hand over your phone rule.

It's hard to imagine the situation from the details you have given, I have four more questions:

Is it a large workforce?
Does the workforce use phones as part of their job?
Is it a job where using a phone stops the person from being productive? (Both hands and/or full concentration required.)
Are there areas out of sight where people can hide to make calls while pretending to be doing their work related duties?

From what you have said here, these few people should receive warnings and then be sacked if they can not change their behaviour.

Is it a large workforce? Not sure.
Does the workforce use phones as part of their job? No.
Is it a job where using a phone stops the person from being productive? (Both hands and/or full concentration required.) Probably not as long as they keep it brief or have a bluetooth.
Are there areas out of sight where people can hide to make calls while pretending to be doing their work related duties? Yes.

It's just a cleaning job.

At this point my mother's boss is going to talk to her boss to see if they can do it.

Sounds like the management are paranoid after catching a few people on the phone that everyone is doing the same.

I think your mother should talk with the others who act fairly over their phone use. Either write a group letter stating the reasons why each person needs a phone and all sign it, or all write individual letters, leave out those who are causing the problems.

Our company has a policy to turn our phones off, but they would never take them from employees. That there is a privacy violation.

No cell phones are allowed in the work space where work (grocery store.) If someone were to pull out a phone and start talking while on work time they would be called out in 2 seconds.

There is a policy at my job that only the supervisors can carry a cell phone. Of course, the underlings do it and use their phones frequently. If they get caught by the director they'll have their phones confiscated. An employee was fired once because she was warned about it but did it again anyway. I guess sacrifices have to be made.

And if you want to get paid for chatting sh*t on the phone, go work in a call center.

What I don't understand is, how come people have been able to work and -not- have mobile phones for centuries on end?
Is it just me, or does it seem ridiculous to use 'in case there is an emergency' as an excuse in many professions. Anyone (I presume) who work in an office have access to the landline. If you work at a restaurant or a store, there are landlines there too. If you work construction, usually there will be an office type thing at the site. Hospital; landline. Schools, colleges, universities, daycare facilities; they have landlines!
Now, if you are a bus- or cab- or train-driver, or if you are a contractor or whatever, you will probably not be easy to reach, but most of us would probably be within reach of a landline or other office phone.

I think it's really about people not taking responsibilities seriously. If someone has a mind numbing, could do in you sleep, type job then why not let them chat through their shift? As phones get "smarter" everything is on there, music, diary etc. and if you can talk hands free then the occasional call should not be a problem. Most people now would rather talk to someone on their phone than talk to the person in the same room when they get a break.

It's the people who want to sit on their bums while chatting which are the problem, and it's only going to get worse. I used to work with teenagers and the condition was that phones were not to be used in certain areas. Few could manage this rule, confiscation would cause massive problems and the reaction could be compared to amputating part of their body.

The 3 jobs I had required them to be turned off unless you were on break or had permission from management. 1 job was a restaurant & the other 2 were retail. I had permission from management at one of the retail jobs to text my supervisor when he was off so I kept my phone on silent mod on those days & only pulled it out to check for messages when I had a second in-between a task. At all the jobs some people would go in bathroom stalls to talk on their phones & they'd text when management wasn't around but they got in trouble when they got caught.