Grangemouth refinery dispute

That doesn’t really make any sense, considering the lack of discussion and negotiations on the subject.

Well I’ve been reading about these discussion for the last three weeks in the broadsheets…..

http://www.thesundaytimes.co.uk/sto/business/Industry/article1323747.ece

the company wrote off the value of that plant to show a loss and that, actually, the plant operated at substantial profit in 2011 and 2012.

One glarring hole in your logic, if it’s profitable, why close it?

They’re closing, therefore presumably it’s not profitable, otherwise they’d not close (or make more of an effort to sell it).

footflaps, nope- what you’re reading about there is the negotiations over the Deans case, with Ineos making comments to the press about working conditions. Not the same thing at all.

No matter how much people might dislike the management of the negotiations. When the management asked the workforce to accept the deal or the plant will close. It was a mistake by the union to start calling their bluff because the company had all the cards. And now it’s the workers who lose.

ti_pin_man – Member
I’ve never seen unions do anything worthwhile.

Do you think employee benefits were given from the kindness of employers’ hearts?

Just as a point of order there… The union couldn’t call anyone’s bluff, Ineos contacted workers directly and of the responses, a majority were against. The union didn’t call for that- they asked members to not respond. So to say that’s the union’s work is just odd.

I can understand the confusion mind, Ineos’s response is “Regrettably, the union advised union members to reject any form of change.” Which is just a total howler, but tells you what they’d like you to believe (and also tells you they’ve no interest in the truth)

thisisnotaspoon – not my logic. I was putting over the union’s stance on it.

If it’s profitable why close it? Perhaps they can make more money elsewhere and they don’t like a workforce that stands up for itself? I don’t know.

Diageo closed the Johnnie Walker plant in Kilmarnock and that was making a profit because they could make even more by ‘rationalising’ operations

further to Northwind’s last post, they (ineos) have employed Mediazoo to brief their management and spin their press releases. I’ve read some pretty vile criticism of Pat Rafferty regarding his eloquence – or lack of – (as well as his religious beliefs) but if you look at Mediazoo’s website you’ll see they boast of putting spin on situations such as these, as well as helping clients deflect criticism on subjects such as workplace fatalities and child labour and yet the union is demonised?? Strange times in which we live

Asking members not to respond is just stupid. The company had to decide on the future of the site and had to know if the staff agreed with the offer.
It wasn’t a time for games.

Sancho – Member

Asking members not to respond is just stupid. The company had to decide on the future of the site and had to know if the staff agreed with the offer.

Irrelevant though, the staff rejected the “offer” anyway, just by a smaller margin than would have happened otherwise. To be blunt, Ineos knew what the employee response would be when they took that course of action… And can you really say the union’s response was important to Ineos, when they’re just going to lie about it anyway?

If it was so important that the company knew how the workforce viewed the offer why didn’t they make this very issue clear weeks ago . The dispute was originally over treatment of Steven Deans.

Given they recently moved the Grangemouth plant into a separate UK company so it could qualify for regional aid and started negotiating for said aid, this suggests the plant closing wasn’t a foregone conclusion as moving assets between companies isn’t ‘free’ and takes up lawyers and accountants times.

Actually that to me screams that they were planning this. Basically take the plant out of the corporate structure and now it will go bankrupt. Much cheaper than shutting it down as part of the main business and having to make people redundant.

Does seem like poor tactics from the union. Seems like the owners had a vastly stronger position yet the union didn’t notice. Sometimes you need to know when you are going to lose and minimise losses rather than plough on regardless and lose everything.

so it appears the 2 plants where split as seperate companies,one is being liquidated, so can be sold off cheap, it also stops inneos, having to pay any redundancy pay, to f/t workers and agency staff, also suppliers have to join the queue as creditors,then there are the clear up and dismantling costs that they now dont have to pay, and the uk governmnet pick up the basic statutory redundancy for workers made redundant by the liquidators.

Then if its sold as a plant, old staff can re apply for their jobs back on new conditions of service and as new employees of a new company.

But then i may be wrong.

“I’ve never seen unions do anything worthwhile.”

They were born of such brilliant of noble intentions.

Sadly like everything those that rise up the ranks enrich themselves or divide.

I hears that in some organisations you are actively ‘urged’ to join the union and pay into their fund even if you dont really want to. Nice.

Regarding the closure of the plant and loss of jobs…

What would happen if the full work force stood up to INEOS and decided ‘stuff you, we’re keeping the place running’

The lines are still running so don’t make the reported 50 million loss etc…

Just curious…

What would happen if the full work force stood up to INEOS and decided ‘stuff you, we’re keeping the place running’

Inneos still have control over the bank accounts for paying and acepting money in and out.Staff wouldnt get paid and sneither would suppliers.

Sadly like everything those that rise up the ranks enrich themselves or divide.

Nonsense, you only have to look back to the 80s and the hero Scargill, who saved all the miners and UK mining whilst living like a Pauper*.

* There were some nasty rumours he made himself life president of the NMU and then had them fund a million pound grace and favours flat, but obviously these are all completely untrue

Eric Joyce has an interesting blog on the subject

Grangemouth Tragedy

Please remember there are forumites that are out of a job due to this today as well. 🙁

Eric Joyce of course is a renowned voice of sober wisdom. “Following the strike” that never happened? As for buyers worrying about employer/employee relations, the fact that Ineos have no working relationship with their employees shouldn’t be a concern for any company that aren’t a shower of bawbags.

I feel for the workers and their families who are now out of work and with Grangemouth on their CV will find it very hard to find a new employer to take them on. But i have to wonder what they were thinking in rejecting the offer, yes its shit and worse than they were on, but as many of the workers have said on the news there is no other employer in the area. So why call their bluff when on the brink, surely it would be better to accept it and then look to move on or work to improve conditions, either way in my view is better than being kicked out of work and losing your pension and everything.

Perhaps lots of the older guys approaching retirement weren’t going to let their final salary pension disappear and so bit the bullet ?

ineos website has gone down.

But i have to wonder what they were thinking in rejecting the offer,

Something along the lines of the company being able to do the same again and again…
I subscribe to the theory that the company have a plan here, they wanted to make use of this situation, they wanted the shutdown to happen. Even heading into liquidation, I somehow doubt INEOS will lose.
Unlike the employee’s.

Well no, I’m guessing they are going to be in pocket by £10m a month, which is really the point.

Why should they have payed to keep it open?

The situation apparently became desperate extremely quickly. Employees given only 3 days to decide on terms is pretty poor on the part of Ineos. Only 2 weeks ago the world was told the plant may close by 2017. The employees will feel shell shocked I imagine. Probably still struggling to take it in.

If they have one crumb of comfort then I imagine they will have the backing of governments at Holyrood and Westminster. More support than was given to those in the mining sector that was decimated earlier in the year for a similar number of job losses.

I think its been obvious from the outset that the owner(s) have been intent on closing, and have conducted a pretty careful strategy of putting the union in the frame for it. It seems to have worked: at least, the myopic press reports are putting this view forward, so they’ve got spin doctors working on it.

Wider stuff- there are way too many critically important infrastructure operations in the UK owned by indifferent or callous owners. This is just one of many.

As I have told the great TJ in the past unions have had their day 🙄

I work for a world wide company and our T&Cs are being squeezed in a similar manner to Grangemouth. I am sure a lot of my colleagues will now be re-assessing their desire to resort to industrial action 🙄 Our parent company(American)tried to sell us off last year but due to high “fixed” costs ie wages etc no-one was interested. There has since been a concerted effort to reduce fixed costs by introducing a voluntary leaving scheme to “allow” 40 workers to leave. Rumour has it 10 will be required to leave next year.
My group will be de-manned from 15 to 10 as from Jan 5th. No one will be made redundant/lose their job but the 5 not chosen will lose shift allowance of £7k ❗

My wife who is a senior manager in a Scottish gov dept has had no pay rise in the past 3yrs, screwed for pension and extra yrs to work!

Daughter who is a teacher in England now has to work to a Personal performance regime imposed on teachers! She did get an “outstanding” report on her first Ofsted inspection this year 😆

My son was working for a civil eng company. The senior partner retired. The partner taking over the business had a heart attack! The guy intending to take on a partnership obviously had second thoughts…… He has been fortunate to have been able to go back to his old job but that means trebling his travelling time & costs.

So, sorry as much as I appreciate the importance of Grangemouth To Scotland I have no sympathy with their actions and the fall out from them. It was obvious what was going to happen……

Sancho – Member

But i have to wonder what they were thinking in rejecting the offer

Spoke to my cousin this evening and he basically said they can’t trust ineos, and they all think that they’ll give ground on this only to be shafted again in 6 months or a year- so they’ve basically given up hope of working with them at all.

But, he also said that his colleagues (office staff mind not production) would probably accept the change of working conditions if it also came with a change of owners- how many folks he can speak for I have no idea, but he thinks it’s the only hope for the plant, there was no long term future with ineos.

Most of UK industry could be closed down and stuff shipped in from anywhere else cheaper…..

Most of UK industry could be closed down and stuff shipped in from anywhere else cheaper…..

Well in that case the only conclusion has to be that UK industry is in the hands of registered charities. Bless them and their generous, benevolent, and philanthropic ways.

Commiseration to any STWers at Grangemouth. I hope that there is some positive resolution over next few days. Sounds a bloody mess all round.

According to BBC Unite will meet INEOS on Thursday and the union will agree to accept INEOS plan. I hope that a deal is reached though even then it will be a sad day for ordinary workers.

According to the BBC Unite said they may agree to the INEOS plan, they haven’t accepted anything.

I suspect that this particular event may not have been in INEO’s plan.

I stand corrected , Unite may agree to INEOS plan.

The final salary pension scheme was a big part of the dispute, I understand. That will have turned out to be unaffordable when it was realised that investments are not performing as projected and probably (as in our case at my company) that the actuaries were using life expectancy figures from the seventies. Anybody who still expects to retire on such a scheme is living in cloud-cuckoo land.

My own employer has just finished paying around £1.5 million into the scheme for the 53 of us who joined it so as to bring it in line; we have now all agreed to move to another more realistic pension scheme.

Unite said they may agree to the INEOS plan, they haven’t accepted anything

I doesn’t work like that. Unite like all trade unions is a democratic organisation, it can’t simply agree to less favourable terms for its members. Any decision has to be made by its members.

Workers were given the grim news at a meeting with Ineos’s chairman, Calum MacLean. Ineos had given the workforce until Monday evening to accept its demands for radical changes to terms and conditions but the company concluded there was not enough support.

Not being pedantic btw, it’s important to remember that the position taken a trade union is always dependent on its members, I think people too often forget that.

Not being pedantic btw, it’s important to remember that the position taken a trade union is always dependent on its members, I think people too often forget that.

Does it? or does the trade union take a position then try and get it’s members in line?

Is the democracy not when they take things to a ballot, up until that point they are negotiating on behalf of the employees on what they think is right.

Well of course trade unions make recommendations to their members – it’s their job to do so. But the decision whether to accept or reject an offer is made by the membership, not their negotiators.

I’m amazed that has to be pointed out so clearly.

Ernie, I’m amazed you believe it to be true.