Shapps looks to strong arm P&O with minimum wage law changes
Ministers are hatching plans to try and strong arm beleaguered ferry firm P&O into rehiring the 800 workers it unceremoniously sacked this month, with Grant Shapps warning bosses they had “little choice” but to reverse the decision.
In a letter to P&O boss Peter Hebblethwaite, Shapps said he was working on proposals to require firms operating in UK ports to pay minimum wage and “ensure that seafarers are protected against these types of actions”.
“Through that package, I intend to block the outcome that P&O Ferries has pursued, including paying workers less than the minimum wage,” he wrote.
Shapps said that the package being brought forward will offer up “one further opportunity” to give the sacked seafarers their jobs back on the previous terms of employment.
Sources close to Shapps have told the BBC today that he hoped the firm will “see reason and step back”.
P&O has looked to skirt round minimum wage requirements using a legal loophole which allows operators to pay less than the minimum wage if workers are registered overseas.
The average rate paid to agency staff brought in by P&O Ferries to replace the sacked staff would be £5.50 per hour, with unions claiming some staff would be paid £1.80.
P&O’s decision to sack 800 of its staff on the spot last month triggered a major political backlash, which was then spurred on further as Hebblethwaite admitted to MPs that the firm knew the decision was illegal but pressed ahead regardless.
Bosses at P&O said the firm was forced to take the decision to stay afloat as it battled mounting debts accrued during the pandemic.
Rival ferry firms DFDS and Stena Lines have been called in to meet government officials to help cover the disruption over the Easter holidays, as concern grows that shipping lines will not be able to meet demand.
P&O decision to cut 800 of its staff without notice came after it calculated that it would cost 309m to sustain the business for at least three months while consulting with staff over job losses, PA reported yesterday.
The firm decided against a staff consultation over fears it would disrupt the business in the long term while offering no guarantees of recovery.