Wednesday, October 23, 2013

Ineos Closes Grangemouth

STUC general secretary Grahame Smith today called for the closure of the Grangemouth refinery to be treated as a similar economic emergency to the Royal Bank of Scotland collapse. Downing Street, however, has indicated there will be no bail-out for Grangemouth. Scotland’s biggest industrial plant  is worth about £1 billion to the Scottish economy. One member of staff claimed that Grangemouth Petrochemicals chairman Calum Maclean had been "smiling" when he made the closure announcement.

Smith said: “As many have noted over the recent period, the Grangemouth complex is too important to the Scottish economy to be closed on the vindictive whim of an unaccountable billionaire. When the stability of the economy was threatened by the failure of RBS and HBOS, government was quick to act. Now when the stability of the Scottish economy is threatened by the industrial blackmail tactics of INEOS, government must again find the will to act.”

The local Labour MP for Linlithgow and Falkirk East, Michael Connarty, hit out at the firm’s handling of the crisis. “It was very strange - like 1920s gangland boss type of management and not sensible negotiation as it should have been.”

Unite has accused the company of "playing Russian roulette" with the future of Grangemouth.

The billionaire majority owner of Ineos, Jim Ratcliffe, is now one of the richest people in the UK. His “super-yacht” Hampshire II is moored at the French Riviera port of La Ciotat.

The sad reality of capitalism is that if massively rich capitalists cannot have massive returns on their investment they walk away and find other sources of profit to exploit. Part of the blackmail tactics was to pressure the government into financing the upgrade that Grangemouth required to compete more effectively. Perhaps that will happen but then the government also will be adding their power to Ineos to force the work-force into accepting cuts in their pay and conditions. As for the promised 15,000 pounds compensation offered to workers for accepting reduced wages, the small print says up to 15,000. I hazard a guess that only a few employees will be entitled to the maximum.

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