GMB Union welcomed the decision of the Labour Party NEC to exclude Carillion from the exhibition space at the Labour Party Conference in Brighton next week as a major boost the GMB's campaign to blacklist the blacklisters from public contracts till they own up, clean up and pay up.

GMB has now got the space that was allocated to Carillion and it will be used to ask Labour Councillors from across the UK to follow the lead of the Welsh Government exclude Carillion and the other blacklisters from public contracts until the compensate the 3,213 workers they excluded from employment because they were trade union and health and safety representatives. See notes to editors for text of press release from Welsh Government.

GMB lawyers in June 2013 lodged claims in the High Court in London seeking compensation for 70 GMB members blacklisted by Carillion and other construction employers.

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Blacklisting came to light when in 2009 the Information Commissioners Office (ICO) seized a Consulting Association database of 3,213 construction workers and environmental activists used by 44 companies to vet new recruits and keep out of employment trade union and health and safety activists. Over 60% of those on the blacklist were aged between 30 and 50 in the mid1990s. They were mainly active trade union lay leaders on construction sites.

Paul Kenny, GMB General Secretary, said: "The Labour Party must be applauded for kicking Carillion out of the exhibition hall at its Conference. Clearly they are as sick as the rest of the Labour Movement by Carillion and their blacklisting mates.

"Hot on the heels of last week's decision by the Welsh Assembly to blacklist the blacklisters from public contracts in Wales, the Labour Party NEC has shunned Carillion from their Conference.

"The exhibition space will be used to ask Labour Councillors from across the UK to follow the lead of the Welsh Government to close the net on the blacklisters like Carillion until they own up, clean up and pay up.

"Left to their own devices the employers spied and they lied. What the companies say and what the companies do are two different things.

"For any worker to be represented by a trade union in their workplace is a civil right that must be protected to the highest level, with new legislation backed by imprisonment and unlimited fines for anyone who interferes with it. For the Labour Party, these should be bread and butter manifesto commitments right now."

(CD/MH)