Skip to main content
      Home News & insight News Scottish trade unions react to P&O Ferries Holyrood appearance
      Industrial

      Scottish trade unions react to P&O Ferries Holyrood appearance

      29 March 2022

      Image:Many ordinary people, unions and sacked workers expressed their anger at the P&O Ferries layoffs of 800 worker by taking part in protests throughout the UK. Image: Wikimedia Commons/Dover protest
      Many ordinary people, unions and sacked workers expressed their anger at the P&O Ferries layoffs of 800 worker by taking part in protests throughout the UK. Image: Wikimedia Commons/Dover protest

      The Scottish Trades Union Congress (STUC) has called on the UK government to prove it is on the side of unfairly dismissed workers, not the 'the multi-million-pound profiteers of DP World and P&O [Ferries]', after the appearance of CEO Peter Hebblethwaite at the Scottish Parliament's Net Zero, Energy and Transport Committee today.

      STUC general secretary Roz Foyer expressed the anger of ordinary people, unions and the sacked workers:

      'Hebblethwaite's appearance at the Scottish Parliament today was as pathetic as it was shambolic and entirely representative of how P&O have behaved these past weeks,' she said.

      'He calls this a "controversial" move – we call it breaking the law. He calls it "material change" – we call it a mass culling. Hiding behind his language of operating models and balance sheets are workers. All 800 of whom should be immediately reinstated on the exact terms and conditions from when they were disgracefully sacked.

      'We cannot permit P&O – or any other company – casting workers and employment law aside with such impunity. This cannot be allowed to stand. Not now and not ever again.

      'P&O are now the test case for whether the UK government, who are responsible for the state of employment law, are backing the multi-million-pound profiteers of DP World and P&O or backing the people impacted by their callous actions.'

      Tags

      More articles

      Industrial

      Lawbreaking and crew fatigue: P&O Ferries CEO addresses MSPs

      P&O Ferries chief executive Peter Hepplethwaite was called ‘a failure of a chief executive’ by Members of the Scottish Parliament today as he once again admitted to breaking the law in sacking 800 seafarers to bring in agency crew paid below the minimum wage.

      • News
      • 29 March 2022
      Industrial

      Pride of Kent detained after failing safety inspection

      One of P&O Ferries' best-known vessels, the Pride of Kent, has been detained in Dover after failing a Maritime & Coastguard Agency (MCA) inspection on Monday 28 March.

      • News
      • 29 March 2022
      Industrial

      P&O Ferries executives fail to address key demands in meeting with Nautilus

      A meeting between representatives of Nautilus International with P&O Ferries executives on Friday broke up after just 20 minutes when the company continued to insist it acted correctly in sacking 800 staff and failing to consult with unions.

      • News
      • 28 March 2022

      Become a Nautilus member today

      Join
      Find out more