{"id":1396524,"date":"2022-03-23T13:44:53","date_gmt":"2022-03-23T17:44:53","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1396524"},"modified":"2022-03-23T13:44:56","modified_gmt":"2022-03-23T17:44:56","slug":"boris-johnson-says-dubai-owned-po-ferries-broke-law-by-firing-all-british-crew","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/boris-johnson-says-dubai-owned-po-ferries-broke-law-by-firing-all-british-crew\/","title":{"rendered":"Boris Johnson Says Dubai-Owned P&#038;O Ferries Broke Law by Firing All British Crew"},"content":{"rendered":"<aside class=\"mashsb-container mashsb-main mashsb-stretched\"><div class=\"mashsb-box\"><div class=\"mashsb-count mash-medium\" style=\"float:left\"><div class=\"counts mashsbcount\">26<\/div><span class=\"mashsb-sharetext\">SHARES<\/span><\/div><div class=\"mashsb-buttons\"><a class=\"mashicon-facebook mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/sharer.php?u=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.conservativenewsdaily.net%2Fbreaking-news%2Fboris-johnson-says-dubai-owned-po-ferries-broke-law-by-firing-all-british-crew%2F\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Facebook<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-twitter mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/intent\/tweet?text=&amp;url=https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/?p=1396524&amp;via=ConservNewsDly\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Twitter<\/span><\/a><a class=\"mashicon-subscribe mash-medium mash-nomargin mashsb-noshadow\" href=\"#\" target=\"_top\" rel=\"nofollow\"><span class=\"icon\"><\/span><span class=\"text\">Subscribe<\/span><\/a><div class=\"onoffswitch2 mash-medium mashsb-noshadow\" style=\"display:none\"><\/div><\/div>\n            <\/div>\n                <div style=\"clear:both\"><\/div><\/aside>\n            <!-- Share buttons by mashshare.net - Version: 4.0.47--><div><\/div>\n<p class=\"subheading\">LONDON (AP) \u2013 The British government said Wednesday that a Dubai government-owned ferry operator at the center of a bitter U.K. labor dispute likely broke the law when it fired 786 crew members without notice to replace them with cheaper contract staff.<\/p>\n<p>Prime Minister Boris Johnson condemned the \u201ccallous\u201d behavior of P&#038;O Ferries and said the company appeared to have broken British labor laws.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"D-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B1\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<figure id=\"gmxrevmore\" class=\"H\"><\/figure>\n<p>\u201cWe will be taking action,\u201d Johnson said, adding that the company could \u201cface fines running into millions of pounds\u201d if it is found guilty.<\/p>\n<p>P&#038;O Ferries, which operates in Britain and is owned by a subsidiary of Dubai company DP World, claimed the move was legal because the staff worked on ships registered outside the U.K. The ferry operator acknowledged that the way the dismissals were carried out caused distress for workers and said it had offered \u201cgenerous compensation\u201d to those involved.<\/p>\n<p>But the company also said it couldn\u2019t have survived without \u201cfundamentally changed crewing arrangements\u201d and that it took the action to save 2,200 other jobs. The dismissed seafarers are being replaced by cheaper workers employed by a third-party crew provider.<\/p>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B2\" class=\"a8d\"><\/figure>\n<p>The staff cuts \u2013 which came after P&#038;O received millions in British government aid during the COVID-19 pandemic \u2013 have caused outrage and sparked protests by trade unions at U.K. ports. P&#038;O canceled all its ferry crossings between Britain, Ireland and continental Europe after the announcement last week, disrupting the movement of both travelers and goods.<\/p>\n<p>Trade unions have long objected to \u201cfire and rehire\u201d policies that let companies fire staff members and reemploy them on worse terms. Under British labor laws, such extreme action is only meant to be done after extensive employee consultations.<\/p>\n<p>P&#038;O chief executive Peter Hebblethwaite said that \u201crestructuring our workforce in this way was not a course of action that we ever wanted to take.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>\u201cWe did this as a last resort and only after full consideration of all other options,\u201d he said in a letter to the government.<\/p>\n<blockquote class=\"twitter-tweet\" data-width=\"550\" data-dnt=\"true\">\n<p lang=\"en\" dir=\"ltr\">Dubai-Owned Ferries Operator Fires ALL British Crew, Brings In Cheap Foreign Workers<a href=\"https:\/\/t.co\/zdw7xwLwab\">https:\/\/t.co\/zdw7xwLwab<\/a><\/p>\n<p>\u2014 Breitbart London (@BreitbartLondon) <a href=\"https:\/\/twitter.com\/BreitbartLondon\/status\/1504865212351979521?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw\">March 18, 2022<\/a><\/p>\n<\/blockquote>\n<figure id=\"M-ROS-B3\" class=\"a8d adSo\"><\/figure>\n<p>The letter came in response to Business Secretary Kwasi Kwarteng\u2019s request for information amid outrage from workers and allegations that P&#038;O violated U.K. labor laws. Kwarteng last week said it appeared the company hadn\u2019t followed the required process for dismissing large numbers of workers and notified it that failure to do so was a criminal offense that could lead to an unlimited fine.<\/p>\n<p>The National Union of Rail, Maritime and Transport Workers reacted angrily to the P&#038;O letter, saying the \u201cdisgusting statement\u201d sought to justify the company\u2019s \u201cshameful acts.\u201d<\/p>\n<p>The ferry operator, a unit of Dubai-government owned logistics giant DP World, said the dismissed crew members worked on eight ships registered in the Bahamas, Bermuda and Cyprus. They were employed by three P&#038;O units incorporated in Jersey, a self-governing crown dependency that isn\u2019t part of the U.K.<\/p>\n<p>Crew members employed by two other subsidiaries based in France and the Netherlands weren\u2019t fired, P&#038;O said.<\/p>\n<p>P&#038;O gave advance notice of the firings to authorities in the countries where the ships are registered, Hebblethwaite said. As a result, P&#038;O doesn\u2019t believe it violated U.K. laws.<\/p>\n<p>P&#038;O has announced that it will pay workers 13 weeks salary to compensate for the lack of advance notice, and another 13 weeks salary in lieu of consultation. In addition, P&#038;O says dismissed crew members will receive 2\u00bd weeks salary for every year of service, instead of the legally required 1\u00bd weeks.<\/p>\n<p>About 575 of the dismissed workers have accepted the severance package, P&#038;O said.<\/p>\n<p>But the RMT union said the package amounted to \u201cblackmail and threats\u201d because workers will only receive a fraction of the payout unless they give up their legal right to file an action with the employment tribunal.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThey have ripped away the jobs, careers and pensions of our members and thrown them on the dole with the threat that if they do not sign up and give away their rights they will lose many thousands of pounds in payments,\u201d General Secretary Mick Lynch said in a statement.<\/p>\n<h5 class=\"western\"><em><span>Follow Breitbart London on Facebook:<\/span><\/em><em>\u00a0<\/em><em><a href=\"https:\/\/www.facebook.com\/BreitbartLondon\/\"><span>Breitbart London<\/span><\/a><\/em><\/h5>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>LONDON (AP) \u2013 The British government said Wednesday that a Dubai government-owned ferry operator at the center of a bitter U.K. labor dispute likely broke the law when it fired<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":54,"featured_media":2315279,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_mo_disable_npp":"","fifu_image_url":"","fifu_image_alt":"","footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1396524","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1396524","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/54"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1396524"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1396524\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/2315279"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1396524"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1396524"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.conservativenewsdaily.net\/breaking-news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1396524"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}