The Business Secretary said that he had concluded there was "clearly no policy of discrimination" at the oil refinery at the centre of the disputes. However, trade unions insist that British workers are being automatically rejected when applying for work, with firms using an obscure European law to bring their own workforces to carry out work in this country.
Strike action spread on Monday with workers at two nuclear power stations and several other sites joining the unofficial action.
The dispute is also threatening to escalate into a major diplomatic incident. The Italian Government described the strikes as "indefensible". The Governor of Sicily warned that the employment of Britons on the Italian island may be threatened.
The British ambassador in Rome was sent to reassure the Italian Government that Italians would not face discrimination in this country.
The dispute is centred on a £200 million construction project at the Total oil refinery at Lindsey in north Lincolnshire. The contract was awarded to an Italian firm, IREN, which has brought a large number of Italian and Portuguese workers to Britain to complete the work. It is claimed that a British firm was initially awarded the contract but was unable to complete the work.
Lord Mandelson and Gordon Brown have seized on assurances from Total that British workers are not discriminated against. Total has also pledged to work with its contractors to ensure that Britons are employed.
The Business Secretary told the House of Lords: "On the Lindsey site, the great majority of the workers are actually British, so clearly no policy of discrimination or exclusion of British nationals is being operated at the refinery.''
He added: "Membership of the European Union, and taking advantage of the opportunities for trade presented by the EU, are firmly in the UK's national interest. Free movement of labour and the ability to work across the EU has been a condition of membership for decades."
He had earlier rebuked an interviewer asking questions about workers' concerns, saying: "Stop feeding this xenophobia."
However, the comments have been undermined by the managing director of IREN who said that he was forced to only use Italian workers for most of the contract.
Mario Saraceno said that the contract had to be finished within four months. Therefore, he said: "That's why it was absolutely necessary to send to England our specialized workers, a close-knit team that could communicate with each other without language problems, which was particularly important from a safety point of view.
"There was no time for training and so, with the agreement of the British unions, we contracted out the work [to Italians]. But we also took on 30 British workers, among them technicians and labourers."
Strike action spread to nuclear sites and power plants across Britain on Monday. More than 900 workers walked out at Sellafield. The workers, who are liaising via web sites and mobile phone text messages, are thought to be planning a co-ordinated national strike later in the week.
The issue is causing a split at the highest levels of the Labour Party. Alan Johnson, the Health Secretary and former union leader, has called for European directives to be renegotiated if necessary. It is claimed that firms are using loopholes in European law to only hire workers from certain countries. The proposal for the Government to intervene is also backed by senior Labour figures including former ministers Peter Hain and Frank Field.
Ministers are awaiting a formal report from Acas, the independent arbitration service, into the causes of the strike. Trade unions are calling for all contractors working on public infrastructure projects to sign contracts guaranteeing fair access to British workers.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/energy/4436818/Wildcat-strikes-threaten-to-escalate-after-Lord-Mandelson-calls-protests-xenophobic.html
JPTF 2009/02/02
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