The Dubai-headquartered ferry operator, which sacked the workers last week without consultation, is hiring agency workers to replace the staff on lower wages. It said the action was necessary because it made losses of £100m last year.
The RMT and Nautilus unions are considering what legal action to take. Trade union law firm Thompsons described the sackings as ‘a shocking disregard of the most basic employment law.
‘The law states that if you’re dismissing more than 20 employees, you must consult with them. The larger the number of employees being dismissed, the longer the consultation should be―up to 45 days.’
Alex Mellis, of No5 Barristers’ Chambers, said: ‘In the short term, we may well see the trade unions seek an injunction in the High Court, although we would expect to see it imminently if it were to happen at all and it is likely to enter a relatively untested area of law.
‘This would essentially force P&O to carry out the consultation with workers that should have happened.’
He said the unions could also bring a complaint to the employment tribunal for failure to provide consultation, and the tribunal could order a protective award ‘in the form of a week’s pay for a period of 90 days, dependent on the severity and egregiousness of the breach by the employer, so we could see P&O needing to pay out up to 90 days’ additional pay for all 800 employees.’
Mellis said: ‘There are also grounds for these workers to individually claim for unfair dismissal...the pay-out will be capped at a year’s salary for every employee who takes this step, which may well be a similar amount to the recently announced “enhanced” redundancy packages that have been discussed.’
