Sellafield workers ‘provoked’ into striking
Workers at the Sellafield nuclear reprocessing plant are on strike today over a long-running pay dispute. The GMB union has claimed that up to 2,400 members of staff are participating in the industrial action, in a bid to gain pay parity between blue collar and white collar workers.
The GMB claims that blue collar workers are losing up to £2,000 a year because of their current pay settlement.
BNFL had allegedly promised that the pay rates would be harmonised by April 2004, but according to the GMB it has ‘reneged’ on the original agreement made in 1999, imposed a deal that was rejected, and then ‘refused to even discuss the matter’.
The strike follows the resignation of BNFL chair Hugh Collum yesterday. Mr. Collum was not due to resign until the middle of next year. The company denies any connection between the two events.
The GMB’s energy secretary Brian Strutton claimed that BNFL had made no effort to resolve the dispute and was ‘hell bent on provoking a confrontation with the workforce’.
The union was also critical of the Trade and Industry Secretary who was asked to intervene in the dispute last month, but has apparently not responded to the GMB’s request.
The strike has prompted safety concerns, but BNFL has insisted that standards will not be compromised as a result of the industrial action. The director of the Cumbrian plant, Brian Watson, commented: ‘The trade union and management’s absolute priority is for the safety of the site, of the workforce and of the community we work in.’
A second strike is due to take place in a week’s time, and further industrial action is likely if a resolution is not reached.
