P&O Ferries and Employment Rights

Sammy Wilson Excerpts

Monday 21st March 2022 Commons Chamber

[Louise Haigh]

My hon. Friend is absolutely right. Successive Tory Governments have created the conditions that allow unscrupulous employers, such as P&O, to exploit that context. It is clear that the Secretary of State has serious questions to answer.

[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

If there is documentation available showing that the Government had prior knowledge of this, it is important that we all have sight of it. What is the date on the document and how long before the event did the Government actually know about it?

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[Grant Shapps]

The right hon. Lady says I am “so annoying” but—[Hon. Members: “Division!”] [Laughter.] I see that the Opposition have the advantage right now. I am trying to explain that the maritime 2050 document is not about something happening in 2050; it is happening right now, and its purpose is to level up conditions between those working onshore and those working on ships. Seafarers, regardless of nationality, who normally work in our territorial waters are now, thanks to this Government, fully protected by our national minimum wage.

Colleagues should be aware that the UK operates under international laws as treaty members, meaning that UK law does not apply in all circumstances—an issue which may in part be in play in this case. A further consideration is that we understand that some seafarers were employed under Jersey law, which has further complicated the legal picture. Such complications allow employers to take advantage in the way that we have seen with P&O Ferries, which is why we will do all we can to ensure that domestic law is applied in full everywhere around the country.

[Sammy Wilson]

The boats on the route from Larne to Cairnryan never deviate, travelling daily from one British port to another British port. Do minimum wage laws apply on that route?

[Grant Shapps]

The laws apply in UK territorial waters, so I believe that they do. I will contact the right hon. Gentleman with the detail.

Despite the current disruption to P&O services, I can confirm that at present no major issues are reported on ferry routes to and from this country. I discussed supply-chain issues with my French counterpart this weekend, and both Government and industry have been working flat out to put alternative arrangements in place to ensure that the supply chain continues.

I place on the record my thanks to Stena for stepping up over the weekend at our request, laying on extra services from Scotland to Northern Ireland. We are monitoring the situation at other ports served by P&O, such as Dover, Liverpool and Cairnryan. I can tell the right hon. Gentleman that Stena will be putting on additional services from Scotland to Northern Ireland from tomorrow, which will be of particular interest to retailers including ASDA and M&S.

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[Sammy Wilson (East Antrim) (DUP)]

I hope that the whole House can agree on this motion tonight. No matter where we are on the political spectrum, no one can defend what we saw happening last Thursday morning. Rather than being a picture of what should happen in the 21st century, it was like something out of a Charles Dickens novel. My constituents came into Larne harbour expecting a turnaround of their ship and then to head off again to Cairnryan. They found that too many buses had arrived, one with a replacement crew and one with a crew to put them off the ship. That is by no stretch of the imagination the way in which workers should be treated in the 21st century. The company has simply ignored all the requirements of law—consultation with workers, replacing workers they say they are making redundant, giving redundancy payments—while it has been planning for weeks and recruiting around the world for replacements. No one can describe that as abiding by the law.

Then the company brought in workers who will be operating at a fraction of the salary of the previous workers. The odd thing about that is that the company says that it was losing £100 million a year and had to deal with that, but it will not overcome that deficit by sacking 800 workers. Those workers were not getting paid £125,000 a year. One has to ask what else this company has in its plan for doing away with its deficit and at the same time supplying a vital service.

It is not only its workers that the company has treated with contempt; it has treated its customers with contempt, too. Those companies that relied on P&O were told, as the lorries were heading towards Larne harbour, “You’d better go elsewhere.” There was no notice given, because they had, of course, operated in secrecy. Larne harbour is owned by P&O and is a strategic point of entry into Northern Ireland. P&O is the only operator from that harbour and it carries 60% of the trade for Northern Ireland, and yet it was closed down summarily. It treated those people who rely on that strategic asset with contempt.

I accept what the Minister has said today and appreciate the work he has done to get extra capacity for Belfast through Stena. Over the past number of days, however, queuing at Cairnryan every day, Asda has had six lorries of fresh food, which cannot be held up, and 14 lorries of food that could stay for a while, although requirements do need to be fulfilled. All that has been held up.

I want three things from this debate. First, pressure must be put on P&O and DP World to ensure that they do not do this again. Secondly, we have to ensure that those workers who have lost their jobs are reinstated. Thirdly, action must be taken to address the issues and weaknesses that we now know about in the law, to punish this company and also to send a message.