UPDATE: Around 900 Workers Sacked At Total Lindsey Refinery
June 19 2009 - 5:43AM
Dow Jones News
Total SA (TOT) said Friday around 900 contract workers at its
U.K. Lindsey oil refinery are to have their contracts terminated
after staging unofficial strike action this week.
"Total can confirm, with regret, that our contractors have now
started the process of ending the current employment contracts for
their workforce on the HDS-3 [hydro-desulfurization] construction
project," the company said in a statement.
"GMB condemns the action of Total," said the general-secretary
of the GMB union Paul Kenny. "Total have for a full week refused to
meet the union to resolve the problems through Advisory
Conciliation and Arbitration Service."
He warned that discontent over the way the company had handled
the negotiations could see the unofficial strikes and protests
spread further. "It seems pretty obvious that there is a mass case
of victimization taking place here."
A spokeswoman at Total said the main contract company Jacobs
Engineering Group Inc. (JEC) had informed workers of the decision
Thursday. Workers will be able to reapply for their jobs until 1600
GMT on June 22.
The 200,000 barrel a day refinery meanwhile continues to operate
as normal, Total said.
Dow Jones Newswires contacted Jacobs' office in Scotland but was
referred to the company's headquarters in California, no one was
immediately available there to comment.
-By Angela Henshall and Nick Heath, Dow Jones Newswires; (4420)
7842 9405; nicholas.heath@dowjones.com