Companies building a new £175 million Energy from Waste (EfW) plant in Port Clarence are being urged to pay industry rates and employ local workers.

Skilled local workers staged a protest outside the Teesside site on Monday, 31 July.

Now, unions Unite and GMB have warned further disruption is likely to proceed if companies and sub-contractors continue to fail to adhere to the National Agreement for the Engineering Construction Industry (NAECI), as well as failing to recruit local labour.

The energy project is being financed by Copenhagen Infrastructure Partners, the investment arm of Pension Danmark, while work is being undertaken by Danish-based Babcock & Wilcox Volund.

The work has been sub-contracted out to several companies; Duro Dakovic undertaking the boiler work, ZRE undertaking the pipe work, FJ Booth the steel work and Palmer Scaffolding.

-- Advertisement --

However, Unite said none of the companies are fully following the NAECI agreement and some of the companies have been known to only pay the national minimum wage (£7.50 an hour) on previous UK projects. The union added FJ Booth and Palmer Scaffolding are mirroring the minimum rates of the NAECI agreement of £15.12 an hour, without paying a bonus.

The standard ate payable under the NAECI agreement is £16.97 an hour with an hourly bonus of £2.37 an hour.

Unite regional official Steve Cason, said: "Workers on Teesside are angry and frustrated that the companies involved in the Port Clarence project are frequently ignoring skilled local workers in recruiting for this project and all the companies are failing to adhere to the NAECI agreement.

"Babcock and Wilcox Volund has consistently failed to address our concerns and is deliberately dragging its feet in reaching an agreement to resolve the inherent exploitation occurring on its sites. If there is no agreement then further protests are inevitable.

"If there is no resolution to the dispute, Unite will consider balloting its members over the failure of contractors to enforce the correct pay rates."

Phil Whitehurst, GMB national officer for construction, said: "The companies involved at Port Clarence are ignoring the large, highly skilled local workforce and instead bussing in labour from outside – and not paying them proper wages."

Representatives from Unite and GMB are due to meet senior members of Pension Danmark on Monday, 07 August in an attempt to resolve the dispute.

(LM)