BRITISH PRIME Minister Gordon Brown has condemned a wave of wildcat strikes across the UK protesting against the employment of “foreign” – EU – workers amid fears that the unofficial action is set to escalate.
The arbitration and conciliation service, Acas, will today begin a detailed investigation into allegations that British workers at various sites are being excluded from construction contracts, and attendant issues around the “contracting out” of large-scale projects.
The immediate focus is on working conditions at the Lindsey refinery in Lincolnshire, owned by oil giant Total, after an estimated 3,000 workers staged sympathy strikes at refineries and power plants in England, Scotland, Wales and Northern Ireland on Friday. The strikes were in protest at Italian sub-contracting firm IREM’s decision to employ 300-400 Italian and Portuguese workers on a new £200 million contract. Up to 900 contractors at the Sellafield nuclear power plant are to due to vote this morning on whether to join the unofficial walkout in support of the Lincolnshire protest.
In a separate development, thousands of skilled tradesmen from across the country are reportedly set to protest at Staythorpe power station in Nottinghamshire on Wednesday against the employment of Spanish and Polish workers.
The Sunday Timesalso reported that organisers of a planned national march in London next Saturday are in contact with farmers and hauliers who organised the protests against fuel tax in 2000.
In an interview for the BBC's Politics Show, Mr Brown again said he understood workers' fears about job insecurity but insisted the walkouts were "not the right thing to do". To those thinking of joining the protest, the prime minister said: "That's not the right thing to do and it's not defensible. What we've set up is a process to deal with the questions that people have been asking about what has happened in this particular instance."
Business secretary Lord Mandelson promised to ensure British and EU employment rules were properly observed while insisting “protectionism” would turn the recession into a depression.
“I understand peoples’ concerns about jobs and it is important to make sure that both domestic UK law and European rules are being applied properly and fairly. But it would be a huge mistake to retreat from a policy where within the rules, UK companies can operate in Europe and European companies can operate here,” he said.
Senior Labour backbencher John Cruddas, however, insisted the government needed to be “banging heads together” to address underlying issues on which, he suggested, employers were in some instances notoriously “culpable” in this sector.
Conservative leader David Cameron, meanwhile, pointed up “legitimate questions” for the employer at the centre of the Lincolnshire dispute while criticising Mr Brown for ever promising “British jobs for British workers” – the slogan reproduced on protesters’ placards on Friday.
“There are legitimate questions to be asked of this company. If it is disqualifying British workers from applying for jobs, then that is illegal,” said Mr Cameron: “But the prime minister should never have used that slogan. On the one hand he lectures everyone about globalisation and on the other he borrows this slogan from the BNP . He has been taking people for fools and has been found out.”
Long-time Brown critic and former Labour minister Frank Field suggested the wave of unofficial strikes could prove “a double whammy” for the prime minister.
“The claim of ‘British jobs for British workers’ looks like a pretty empty promise,” he said. “Worse still, it shows the European Union has us in a double arm lock. British workers are being excluded from working on contracts by European contractors.”
The Mail on Sunday, however, claimed that an official from the Unite union who addressed protesters at the Total refinery on Friday met directors of the Italian firm in the past month to hammer out the details of a deal to ensure that its Italian workforce in the UK were paid at the same rate as similarly skilled British workers.
The report, filed from Sicily, said this “secret” deal flew in the face of claims last week that British workers’ pay was being undercut by foreign employees who were paid less.