Grangemouth to close!!!!

Why wouldnt you just go work somewhere else as opposed to joining in a strike that could wreck the company, or do nothing and accept less money?

 

Sometimes you have to look at big picture and realize that you have a good job and good conditions,the guys in there get well looked after

My mate works in there clears between £50-55k a year(chemical process worker)
I would bite your hand off for a wage freeze for 3 years and a change to my pension if I was clearing that
Final salary schemes are a thing off the past its not rocket science if the pot off money is less than whats going out it canny keep going

I personally think the workforce thought that the place would never shut and its came to bite them in the *

dont get me wrong people who have been there and were coming up for retirement and it would affect them but thats just the way it goes

If i was making £50k a year I would buy another house and use that as a pension

 

In a nutshell sums up what's wrong with this world, some rich heartless * of a man ruining thousands of people lives, why the rich can decide how the poorer live is a * joke

 

In what way is asking people to take a few freeze for a few years, and change their pension conditions runing their lives?

 

I don't think the people working in Grangemouth can be considered "poor" given they earn more than a fair wage according to people,

 

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Ineos ... a company with a habit of making good on its threats


Steven Vass
Deputy Business Editor, Sunday Herald



Sunday 20 October 2013

YOU only have to look at Ineos's decision to move its headquarters to Switzerland in 2010 to see that it is not a company that messes around.

YOU only have to look at Ineos's decision to move its headquarters to Switzerland in 2010 to see that it is not a company that messes around.



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BY STEVEN VASS


It had very nearly gone bust after the economic crash of 2008 because, like many firms, its massive debts were suddenly unmanageable.
It asked the UK Government if it could defer a £350 million VAT payment for a year while it straightened itself out. When the Government refused, owner Jim Ratcliffe didn't waste time making threats.
He and his senior team might mostly have been north English grammar school boys, but they swiftly decamped from Hampshire to the site of the former Cadbury's European HQ in Rolle on the shores of Lake Geneva, paying the substantial cost of relocating 80 staff and their families at the same time.
An extreme marathon runner into his sixties, Ratcliffe's track record speaks for itself. Having started out as a chemical engineer at Exxon, by the late 1980s he was working as a dealmaker for US private equity group, Advent. After Advent took over BP's fine chemicals division, Ratcliffe became its chief executive before creating Ineos as a vehicle for the management buyout of his company's operation in Antwerp in Belgium in 1998. The deal for Ineos, an acronym of Inspec Ethylene Oxide and Specialities, was the start of a buying spree of unloved blue-chip businesses that saw Ratcliffe enacted a staggering 22 takeovers in 10 years.
This included buying the Grangemouth petrochemical refinery from BP in 2006 as part of a bigger £6 billion takeover. However, refineries have always played second fiddle to the main Ineos operation, which focuses on making essential chemicals for plastics and other oil-based products for everyone from the motor industry to pharmaceuticals. It is now the fourth-biggest chemicals company in the world, with 51 manufacturing facilities in 11 countries in North America, Europe and Asia.
The way the company handled its tete-a-tete with the UK Government is not dissimilar to its industrial relations. When it took on the Grangemouth workforce in 2008 over their final salary pension scheme, it resulted in a rare defeat for the company, which the union believed could have been avoided with more flexible negotiation. Others might say that Ineos' mistake was not recognising that the Forties North Sea pipeline, which is essential for the national oil supply, depends on Grangemouth staying open and puts the workers in a strong position.
Ineos has attempted to ensure in subsequent industrial negotiations that it won't be forced into an embarrassing climbdown again. When it wanted to get staff off the final salary scheme at its Newton Aycliffe plant in County Durham recently, staff were given little choice but to sign up. When the union balloted for strike action, Ineos transferred the workers to a Belgian sister company under TUPE employment rules that do not safeguard pension rights.
At the Runcorn plant in Cheshire, similar changes went through with less upheaval, though the employees were balloted after being refused a pay increase. They are now considering whether to accept a 2.5% offer.
Meanwhile, in the current Grangemouth dispute, the company seems determined to avoid a repeat of 2008. It has fought hard to win the media battle, with tactics including targeting union convener Stevie Deans, suing the union over alledgedly defamatory comments and claiming the plant is losing money. It is, in fact, profitable but is paying out more cash than it is taking in because of investment commitments. This is not normally referred to as a loss, however, since investment is a means of making profits in the future.
Alex Flynn of Unite said: "Industrial relations have always been difficult. They have always been confrontational. If you contrast relations with other big companies like JLR or GM, where there's very much a partnership approach, Ineos are like the Millwall of blue chip industry. Their attitude is - no-one likes us, we don't care."

 

The way Ineos go about their negotiations is shocking, people have written contracts of employment and these * just want to rip them up and say if you dont like it get tae *. People banging on about how much the workers earn.. big deal ..they do actually have to work for it and if you go to the south of England and work in this industry you will earn a lot more than you would here. The crux of the matter is that Ineos are not making enough profit and so they try to alleviate the difference by * over the little guys.

 

Ineos have been a disgrace throughout this entire process. Attempting to subvert the unions by asking for a guarantee of no strike action is absurd, whilst dangling the fate of the plant over the workers heads.

They are a * disgrace! I would nationalise the entire plant in an instant, and give them * all in compensation for the action. They are trying to kill off this countries largest industrial site, and it should never be allowed to happen.

 

If you read the post above it says it is profitable but is only losing money through investment in the plant at the moment and is not normally quoted as losses as investment is a means of making future profits but that wouldn't suit the story they want to portray to the country.

 

You're right Mick. It's all spin from a company * bent on destroying unions and workers rights. Ineos are everything in a company that is despicable. They show all the worst signs of rampant capitalism, displaying greed, an unquenching desire for ever increasing profits, without an ounce of corporate social responsibility.

 

http://socialistworker.co.uk/art/366...h+oil+refinery

* Ineos, blackmailing, greedy wanks

 

Sorry but what are these work conditions?

 

Utter bollocks. Unite have blocked attacks on these guys pensions, and stood up for their members against a company * bent on slashing wages, restructuring companies to TUPE contracts and destroying rights. People have to unite together under the protection of the unions to stop rogue companies like this, riding rough-shod over their rights.

All this attacking union bosses salaries, is right wing rhetoric dredged up from the tabloid rags, who are quick to denigrate union officials, but slow to flag up the massive salaries of the corporate fat cats on millions. If you want to bury your head in the sand, and imagine that INEOS are some kind of poor victim in this matter, go ahead, but we will all pay the price for their greed, if a stance is not taken now.

The whole country needs to stand up in defiance to these clowns.

 

The union members voted to protect their existing conditions using ballot papers from Ineos,this vote was a free vote as is a union ballot and for the workers to reject the terms offered by the company showed how they feel in this fight. ( I know it wasn't a ballot strictly speaking but you get what I mean I hope)

 

Very basic indeed. It is based upon trampling over basic employees rights under protective legislation. If all was left to your simplistic viewpoint, any employer could rip up contracts across the UK and pay any old *. "But at least you'd still have a job" eh?

Ludicrous train of thought! Workers rights are enshrined in law for a reason, to stop corporate greed and the abuse of the working classes.

If your employer came to you and said he was slashing your wages, refusing your pension and changing your work conditions all in his favour, you'd soon wish someone was there to fight your corner.

 

Well everybody knows its a democratic organisation and sometimes the things you want you dont always get.