NSSN statement on the Lindsey oil refinery strike

The strike by more than 1,000 workers at the Lindsey oil refinery (LOR) in north Lincolnshire started on January 28 and ran for over a week. It was supported by solidarity walk-outs across 22 other "Blue Book" sites, workplaces covered by the National Agreement for the Engineering and Construction Industry (NAECI) agreement across England, Scotland and Wales. It hit the headlines, making national and indeed international news.

Against the background of rapidly mounting job losses across many industries, this was a very important dispute, involving widespread unofficial action in defiance of the Tory anti-union laws, retained by New Labour and designed to curb effective resistance by organised workers. The action at Lindsey also posed a challenge to the European Union's Posted Worker Directive, which is spurring a 'race to the bottom' as employers seize on it as a means of attacking pay, terms and conditions.

The immediate trigger to the LOR strike came after Shaws, a previous sub-contractor at the site, owned by the French-based oil multinational, Total, lost its contract with the US-based Jacobs. Shaws had issued 90-day redundancy notices in mid-November, when it later emerged that the new firm at LOR was the Italian-based company, IREM, a non-union outfit, which had indicated it would be bringing its "own" workforce from Italy and Portugal, and not offering any jobs to those faced with redundancy.

Much of the media coverage of the action highlighted the placards and posters held up by some pickets, which called for "British jobs for British workers". The early placards were produced by rank and file industry activists associated with the Bearfacts website, but the slogan has a very dubious history. It has been associated with the BNP, and has since been used both by Gordon Brown in a speech at the 2007 Labour Party conference and leading union officials such as Derek Simpson. Shamefully, Simpson allowed himself to be photographed with two "page 3" models from the viciously anti-union, Daily Star, who held placards with the slogan.

To their credit, strikers told the BNP fascists where they could go when they turned up at pickets. But it took the leadership provided by an unofficial but very effective strike committee to steer the strike away from this slogan and towards clearly progressive goals.

The NSSN believes slogans such as "British Jobs for British Workers" should be firmly rejected by workers, but also recognises that its initial adoption by strikers reflected the vacuum of leadership at the LOR in the wake of the resignation of the previous stewards' committee.

The elected joint union strike committee, which included GMB member and NSSN supporter, Keith Gibson, drew up a series of demands, which were accepted by a mass meeting on Monday 2 February. These included:

• All workers in the UK to be covered by NAECI agreement

• Union controlled registering of unemployed and local skilled union members, with nominating rights as work becomes available

• All immigrant labour to be unionized

• Union help for immigrant workers-including interpreters and union advice

• Force the government to change or withdraw those EU directives and court rulings that exempt non-UK companies from abiding by industry collective agreements

• No victimization of workers taking solidarity action

The settlement to the dispute meant that workers were guaranteed 102 of the 198 jobs on the contract for building a new chemical facility at the LOR site, with no Italian or Portuguese workers displaced. The deal allowed for the shop stewards to check that the jobs filled by the Italian and Portuguese workers were on the same conditions as the local workers covered by the NAECI agreement.
 

The outcome was a real, if partial, victory for the Lindsey workers and put a temporary brake on the "race to the bottom", the drive to push down wages and conditions by exploiting the provisions of the EU posted worker directive and recent rulings by the European Court of Justice.
 

The NSSN congratulates the Lindsey oil refinery workers on the courage and determination they showed during their struggle. In particular, we salute the efforts by the unofficial strike committee that ensured the strike did not go down a reactionary, nationalist path. We will support all efforts by the NAECI national shop stewards forum in opposing redundancies and the 'race to the bottom', where the employers are using EU laws to undermine union negotiated agreements and organisation. At the same time, the NSSN firmly opposes slogans that stress narrow economic nationalism and stands instead for solidarity in defense of workers' interests, whatever those workers' national origin or immigration status.