Strikers reject deal
- 00:02:06
- ITN
Strikers reject deal
Unions have said they are "genuinely making progress" in the bitter dispute over foreign workers being employed at an oil refinery. Wildcat strikes broke out around the country after Total, the company which runs the Lindsey plant in North Killingholme, Lincolnshire, chose an Italian firm to carry out work over a British one. Total has been urging workers to end unofficial action at the refinery as soon as possible, stressing that it had never discriminated against British companies or British workers. Conciliation service Acas chaired a meeting on Tuesday between union officials, representatives of Total and the Italian sub-contractor which has hired its own workforce. Unite member Phil Whitehurst has since told hundreds of protesters at the site that the strike committee is currently in talks with senior members of management involved in the project. Mr Whitehurst said they had been given an increased offer which they would put to the workers shortly. He added: "We are genuinely making progress." An earlier deal which involved offering just a fifth of jobs on the contract to UK workers was rejected and was later improved to see 101 of the 198 jobs offered. The development came after another day of copycat strikes at power stations and other sites across the country in the increasingly bitter dispute. Unofficial strike action at the Lindsey plant sparked solidarity protests, with around 500 workers at Shell's Stanlow Oil Refinery in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, and 250 at Hartlepool engineering company Heerema joining the national walkout on Tuesday. In the House of Commons, Tory leader David Cameron said Prime Minister Gordon Brown's slogan of "British jobs for British workers" showed a "lack of judgment". Mr Brown then asked whether there was anybody who did not want British workers to get jobs in the UK. Mr Cameron said the slogan was "opportunistic and protectionist" and called on Mr Brown to apologise and to promise not to use it again. "You were pandering to people's fears and you know it." Mr Brown said he hoped the striking workers would accept a solution put forward by Acas despite initial "reservations". The Prime Minister hailed new industry guidance saying the availability of domestic workers should always be considered as "the common-sense way of dealing in practical terms with the difficulties".
ITN | February 4, 2009
