The dispute at Grangemouth oil refinery has taken a new twist after union leaders urged Revenue and Customs to investigate the tax affairs of the site’s owners.
Unite said it had concerns that Ineos Group’s arrangements “obfuscate the true position” of its activities.
“The current uncertainty as to the true nature of the company’s UK activities is causing genuine confusion, not least to the Ineos employees we represent, as well as other stakeholders,” Unite general secretary Len McCluskey wrote in a letter to the HMRC.
“My union has employed expert external analysis for the purpose of trying to better understand Ineos at a time of great uncertainty. On the back of our findings I now urge the HMRC to launch a formal investigation into the affairs of Ineos.”
The news follows Unite Scottish secretary’s pledge not to strike at the plant until the end of this year, in return for employers reopening talks about future conditions for workers.
Pat Rafferty’s comment came after First Minister Alex Salmond called for a “truce deal” between unions and operator Ineos, which has shut down the plant on safety grounds in the face of threatened industrial action.
Ineos director Tom Crotty said the company would be ready to reopen the complex on the Firth of Forth if it received formal assurances from Unite that there would be no strike between now and the end of December. The union has called off a 48-hour strike planned for Sunday.
“We will enter happily into an agreement right now that will take us to Christmas, where we will have no industrial action and no ballots.” Rafferty told BBC Radio 4’s Today programme.
“In return for that, all we ask the company to do is sit down with us at the negotiating table over the next 45 days and look to try and seek agreement.
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Rafferty said the no-strike offer until the end of 2013 was on the table at recent talks at conciliation service Acas, but he said Ineos “walked away“ from those talks and moved to impose “detrimental terms and conditions” on workers.
Ineos has previously said it is keeping the plant shut while workers are consulted about proposed changes to issues such as pensions.
Letters have been sent to the homes of Grangemouth workers detailing changes to their terms and conditions, including ending their final salary pension scheme, freezing pay and bonuses, reducing shift allowances and new agreements with unions including having part-time conveners.
The Grangemouth refining and chemicals complex has been shut down twice in the last 40 years – during a previous strike in 2008 and again in preparation for the latest walkout, according to Ineos.
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