The owners of the giant Grangemouth site are considering a last-ditch offer by the union at the centre of the crisis to “embrace” a survival plan aimed at preventing the loss of thousands of jobs.
A flurry of meetings were held throughout the day, with Unite saying it was working to persuade owners Ineos to reverse its shock decision to close the petrochemical complex.
General secretary Len McCluskey said the union had decided they had to embrace the survival plan, “warts and all”, in the wake of the closure decision.
Managers were said to be discussing “everything that has been said”, before deciding whether to reverse the decision to close the petrochemical side of its business, with the loss of 800 direct jobs and up to 2,000 contractors.
An announcement from the company is expected tomorrow.
Meanwhile, UK government officials admitted it would be a “challenge” to find another company to buy the business, which Ineos has said is losing £10 million a month.
The losses, scale of investment needed to upgrade the site, coupled with the industrial relations would all have to be considered by any potential buyer, officials said.
But they insisted there would be no shortage of fuel supplies as a result of the dispute, which has led to the petrochemical site and adjoining oil refinery being closed for the past week.
“We don’t envisage there will be shortages,” said one official.
Ministers from the Scottish and UK government held talks with Unite and management today, saying later that both administrations were doing all they can to keep the site open.
Workers at the petrochemical site, and adjoining oil refinery, had refused to sign up to a survival plan, which included a pay freeze, ending of the final salary pension scheme, and other changes to terms and conditions.
“We are not going to let this plant close. We are encouraged by the comments of the First Minister that he too will not let this plant close,” McCluskey said.
“My union is engaged with thousands of companies every day to negotiate plans to save jobs. There is nothing humiliating about negotiating plans to ensure jobs and communities are safe.
“This plant is on cold shut down and each day that goes by makes it harder to start back up again, which is why the stewards made the offer to the company – so that we can get people back to work.”
Unite said it had made a number of recommendations to owner Ineos, which yesterday announced the closure of the petrochemical plant with the loss of 800 jobs and potentially 2,000 more among contractors.
The company insisted yesterday it had no alternative but to close the business after it failed to persuade its staff to accept a survival plan, saying that white-collar workers such as admin staff had backed the plan, but workers represented by Unite had rejected it.
Politicians have urged the two sides to resume talks to prevent the closure, while efforts are expected to be made to find a potential buyer.
Tom Crotty, a director of Ineos, said the company would put Unite’s proposals to shareholders if there was a “very significant” change from the union.
“The management team on the site will listen to hear what Unite has said,” Crotty told BBC Radio Scotland’s Good Morning Scotland programme.
“The shareholders met after the vote on Monday and, quite understandably in my opinion, took a view that if the workforce had rejected that £300 million investment, then how were they going to go ahead and make it if the workforce were not behind that? That is why the closure announcement has been made.
“If the management team feel that there is a very significant change then I’m sure they would probably feel they would need to take that back to the shareholders and have further discussions.”
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