By Thomas Penny and Rachel Graham
Feb. 4 (Bloomberg) -- Union officials at the U.K.’s Lindsey refinery operated by Total SA recommended contractors return to work after reporting “significant progress” in talks to end a dispute over the use of foreign labor.
A total of 102 new jobs at the refinery will be offered to British nationals for nine weeks, Keith Gibson, a Unite union shop steward, told a mass rally today. There are still “one or two details” to agree and contractors will vote on the offer tomorrow.
About 600 contractors walked out at Lindsey last week after Italy’s IREM brought in its own workers to carry out a construction project. The protest sparked a wave of industrial action across Britain as concerns mount over the severity of the recession and the number of people out of work has surged to an 11-year high.
“It’s a powder keg unless we have a political solution,” Derek Simpson, joint general secretary of the Unite union, said earlier today in an interview with Sky News. “What we really want is proper open and transparent access to apply for jobs.”
Talks between Total, the conciliation and arbitration service ACAS and union representatives continued today, company spokesman Iain Hutchison said in a telephone interview.
Protectionist Charge
The protest is embarrassing for the Labour government and Prime Minister Gordon Brown, who in 2007 said he supported “British jobs for British workers.” David Cameron, leader of the opposition Conservative Party, today accused Brown of pandering to protectionist fears, a charge the prime minister denied.
“We are far from protectionist,” Brown told lawmakers during the weekly Prime Minister’s Questions session in Parliament. “ACAS has put its proposal to the workforce. I hope they will accept that despite their initial reservations.”
Scottish Power, the U.K. unit of Iberdrola SA, said contractors are continuing to strike at two of its power stations.
“It is our understanding that about 500 contractors” from the Longannet and Cockenzie coal-fired plants remain off site, company spokesman Simon McMillan said by phone today.
ConocoPhillips said contractors at its Humber refinery in the U.K. have returned to work after staging a protest.
About 300 contractors at the nearby Immingham power plant are continuing an unofficial strike, company spokeswoman Nina Krogh Nielsen said.
As many as 900 contractors walked out for 24 hours at the Sellafield nuclear fuel-processing plant on Feb. 2.
RWE AG’s U.K. unit said yesterday contractors returned to work at its Didcot, Aberthaw and Tilbury power stations.
Royal Dutch Shell Plc said about 370 contract workers at its St. Fergus gas plant in Scotland joined the strikes Jan. 30 and returned to work Feb. 2. Workers at the company’s Mossmorran processing facility in Scotland also participated in strike action.
Labor unrest also spread in recent days to BP Plc’s Forties Pipeline System and Scottish & Southern Plc’s Fiddler’s Ferry power station in Cheshire.
To contact the reporters on this story: Thomas Penny in London at tpenny@bloomberg.net.
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