Several hundred employees of oil service firm Cape could soon take unofficial industrial action, a North Sea union leader said last night.
Graham Tran, regional officer with the Amicus arm of the Unite union, said the workers were unhappy that the firm had failed to implement the 2007 pay deal agreed by unions and the Offshore Contractors’ Association.
The agreement announced last August allows for four weeks of paid holidays on top of the traditional two-weeks on, two-weeks off shift pattern. Mr Tran said workers were also due to get a 3.2% pay rise, however, he added that Cape employees on more than a dozen North Sea platforms were still waiting for the agreement to come into effect.
The union leader said: “Cape has to honour this deal. It has no right to hold back the pay rise and the paid holidays. I have learned that Cape is now planning to implement the deal on July 3, but this is just the latest date they have set.
“Why should people believe them this time? I have been speaking to my members at Cape and they are very angry at the delay. Some have been talking about holding unofficial action, such as downing tools, on the platforms.
“While I can’t support unofficial action, if it happened the blame lies squarely at the door of Cape and no one else. They would have brought it on themselves.”
Mr Tran said Cape’s actions were now holding up the 2008 pay negotiations for 10,000 people offshore.
A spokesman for Cape in Aberdeen refused to comment, adding: “We deal with employees in-house rather than through the press.”
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