The Bullog- April 2022

P&O: A sinking ship?

March has been a mixed month for the unionised labour movement.

Amazon workers struck a major victory when their New York warehouse voted in favour of creating a Union ?– the first in the company’s history.?The leadership of the likes of corporate giants Amazon and Starbucks have fought hard against this for several years, citing what seem like fairly feeble arguments about preferring to deal with employees directly.

Yet this may prove to be a fairly pyrrhic victory if the experience of the crew of P&O Ferries in the UK is anything to go by. The British Bullogers amongst you will be very familiar with the story, but those of you based elsewhere may not have picked this up.?In essence, the leadership of P&O decided to sack 800 workers and replace them with cheaper foreign staff.?This is in spite of the workers belonging to a Union which seems to have provided scant protection.?The CEO Peter Hebblethwaite’s performance in front of a Commons Select Committee was pretty woeful to say the least. When asked why they’d done this without consulting the union he more or less confessed that “There’s absolutely no doubt we were required to consult with the unions … We chose not to do that.”

The result may end of in some form of charges or criminal investigation against Hebblethwaite and his leadership for their flagrant disregard for the law.?But it does beg the question for Amazon and similar groups just what protection belonging to a union will give them, if the leadership choose not to consult them when they think they won’t like the answer.

Time will tell what happens to P&O and their poor sacked workers.?Nevertheless, I remain convinced that the power in companies is continuing to shift downwards and outwards towards an altogether more democratic corporate world. Whether in the context of an organised Union or not, purpose will matter just as much as pay when it comes to negotiations between employer and employee on the future of the workplace.

This article is an extract from the?April edition of my Bullog, my monthly?blog. To read the full blog or to sign up to receive The Bullog directly each month?visit………www.gibbulloch.com/bullog.