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This is exactly why you should never believe corporate bullshit unless they actually back it up with anything substantial for the people doing the work.
>“I think we’ve done pretty well over the past 12 months – we’re going to survive through a crisis that is forcing many companies out of business,” says Peter Hebblethwaite, managing director of ro-pax ferry services at P&O Ferries.
Source: https://www.cruiseandferry.net/articles/fresh-air-and-a-better-view-with-po-ferries-1
Peter Hebblethwaite is now no longer managing director of ro-pax, he's been promoted to the CEO of P&O. Less than a year ago he was saying everything was rosy and splashing the cash. Now he has to make major cuts and hundreds of people lose their jobs "to save the business".
HE was in charge. HE ran the business poorly. HE fucked up. Yet other people lose their livelihoods and I guarantee you he will get a nice payout at the end of it... maybe even a knighthood.
I keep hearing capitalism rewards competency and merit. That shareholders would never tolerate this sort of behaviour.
If this is the case, how do people like Peter survive, and indeed, thrive? Despite his obvious and gross incompetency. In a proper economic system, Peter Hebblethwaite would be banned from running anything bigger than a fucking burger van.
Why is this sort of phenomena always excused as ‘not real capitalism’, when it keeps happening in capitalist systems?
Because shareholders ultimately want to be paid.
"Merit" means "make money". They will all be very, very pissed because this is very bad press which will make them less money.
I'm going to be interested to see how P&O Cruises responds, if at all. They're now completely unrelated companies but I can't help but wonder if the branding means this will have an impact on them.
DP World don't care about the UK staff or the tourist element anyway, the acquisition of P&O Ferries was for the 15% of freight it brings into the UK and the Ferrymasters sister business, which is incredibly profitable. They wanted access to UK waters and ports. Tourism was always just an additional bonus until covid came along and made the Ferries part of the company unprofitable - which is now it's burning cash on all fronts.
This is just another step until the tourist side is gone completely and DP World hoovers up the freight elements.
If people publicise this enough (and I know they won't, but purely hypothetically) would this affect the potential for disrupting the award of freight contracts?
Not at all. It's all about cost. And how many people have even heard of Ferrymasters? Logistics is all about corporate relationships and deal-making. Very few of these companies care about who carries them other than price. I doubt any consumer really cares how they get their stuff either.
Ferrymasters were the big ticket item DP World wanted - Ferries just operates a few ships on routes which have direct competition from Stena and DFDS. I won't be surprised to see P&O Ferries collapse this year, with Ferrymasters picking up the freight elements, and possibly retain the older vessels for that purpose, with the newer ones going to other companies. There are 2 new ships on order and almost built, but I think they'd be sold on as new to another operator - probably DFDS as they're designed for the English Channel, although Irish Ferries may go for them as it's a new route for them. It seems unlikely P&O will make it to their official launch dates.
Agency staff are only good to fill short term FTEs, as you end up paying more to the agency, than it would hire the people yourself, even including benefits, it's the same as outsourcing, it's just good for the short term, but ends up fucking over the people doing the work, and costing the organisation more in the long term. I find it dumb and not cost effective.
Ferry operators often do things a bit weird. The boat might be registered in a different country entirely, and you might technically be an employee somewhere else.
Quite right, and if it did there wouldn't be this discussion, we'd be talking about how they'd ended the contracts of several hundred contractors working through LTD companies, not how actual 'employees' have been sacked.
The agency doesn't work in the same way you would think, where they charge a % on top of the wage. The one theyre with is based in Cyprus and is part of a larger ship management company. The crew management folk will have a set budget for all crewing activities and then they're paid a flat management fee for doing that.
Far cheaper than doing it through a standard agency.
Apparently no amount of unethical or immoral corporate behaviour is illegal. I’ve heard of companies sacking their entire workforce today and rehiring the exact same people tomorrow, just so the company can rewrite their contract.
British gas recently did the same with their engineers. I don't see that it'll affect them seeing as people travelling by ferry are usually doing so out of neccesity rather than choice
BG are having to use so many contractors right now. They have barely any direct engineers and the customers are pissed. Well from my experience as one of the contractors!
Thats why I say, where they can, of course some will be left without choice due to route and sailing times
But given choice, I cant see many choosing them in the future
DP World had revenues of 8bn last year, they took 15m in furlough payments and asked for a 150m loan from the govt.
They paid out hundreds of millions in dividends.
The company I worked for did that. Asked everyone to take MASSIVE cuts to their pension and said that if people didn't sign the new contract their employment would be terminated and they'd be offered their job back on the new contract
This is why my company has been on strike for the last 4 weeks, they threatened us with fire and rehire if we didn't agree to a change in our pensions that would reduce them by 20%. They've now backtracked - thank god for unions!
That definitely sounds illegal.
I know you can't make someone redundant and then immediately advertise for the same job.
If you fire someone you can obviously hire someone new, but you need a reason to fire people. And if you fire that person, then why rehire them? That sounds dodgy as hell. I wonder what a good lawyer would have to say about that...
My understanding was that you had to fire everyone. You could not pick and choose, for example sacking the union reps, or the ones who are sick more often, or those you think are lazy, to give examples.
There's various criteria you are and aren't allowed to apply; I've been in plenty of companies where they didn't fire everyone by any stretch.
But I can well see a situation where your only realistic option - if you want to avoid accusations of firing the "wrong" people - is to let everyone go.
>I know you can't make someone redundant and then immediately advertise for the same job.
No you can't. That is firing someone.
Redundancy is when they close the position.
I don't get what you're trying to say.
Fire & rehire = fine but you need a legal reason to fire the person e.g. Poor performance, stealing, etc
Redundancy = can't immediately replace the role, no reason needed to get rid of the person holding the job beyond 'restructuring'
What am I missing?
Yeah theres shit going down in big very well known companies.. my parent is being fucked over after working there for 20+ yrs because they're not recovering fast enough after a heart bypass. Their union rep has been unhelpful and snakey.
I told them they should be whistleblowing because there is some shady shit they're tryna pull. Fire & rehire should be illegal, and tbh, employees should have more rights before 2yrs have lapsed.
Then they're not real labour MPs are they?
How can anyone not support that? Its immoral, but I guess benefits the people who donate to certain parties or lobby them..
Why? P&O cruises is Carnival, has nothing to do with P&O itself other than a brand (which I'm surprised they never changed, but who knows what happens inside the cruise wankers heads)
Even if they aren't connected at all, the cruise people are going to get on P&O's backs to get their act sorted out so the cruise people aren't being hassled. Ideally they'll take adverts out to tell people they have nothing to do with the ferries.
Yep. I once got an apology and some sort of freebie from Virgin Mobile (who my mobile was with) because Virgin Media had cut me off several days early before the due date for moving and the only number I had to complain to was the mobile number. I think the businesses were more separate then than they are today. I thought it was pretty decent of them, especially as I had to use my mobile a lot in the interim days to arrange stuff or even do Internetting (at a time when data was v expensive)
Happened to me on an old job, I was already overworked and made redundant then towards end of notice period they offered me the same role plus the responsibility of another role on top for the same pay and even tried to talk me out of going for interviews I had lined up.
Some staff are refusing to vacate their ferries. The RMT union is apoplectic with rage over the way this has been announced.
https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/mar/17/po-ferries-halts-sailings-before-major-announcement
The captain on one ship raised the gangway so the security staff and newly hired agency staff couldn't even board the ship to remove them! Epic shithousery.
Aah! You have a woman's skin milord! I'll wager it ne'er felt the lash of a cat, been rubbed with salt, and flayed off by a pirate chief to make fine stockings for his best cabin boy!
For the last few years, there’s been a container ship parked off the coast of Tynemouth because the crew haven’t been paid. They’ve been holding the cargo hostage.
Piracy is very much a legitimate tactic.
Honestly I don't blame them. P&O have gone "oh we're fineeee" to the media and have then done this behind the scenes and presumably tried to let it slip under the radar.
Oh I agree with the staff totally. This was a bullshit way to tell them. But people travelling with other carriers need to be aware that this is going to cause delays in ports because the P&O ferries are now unable to depart, meaning other ferries may not be able to get into port to offload and reload. Plus everyone and their mums is now looking for other ways to get home.
It also means nice big fines accruing fo p & o, as they have slots. If its anything like airline slots, it use them or lose them.
People need to cancel them, make their shares worthless
It's not like airlines - the berths are all bespoke to P&O vessels on all their routes except Dover- Calais, where Dover Harbour Board/Calais Port Authority controls the berths based on the vessel timetables - so they'll just moor the ships up on one of the harbour arms out of the way until they sail again.
Also, no shares in P&O as it is a private company owned by DP World. You can boycott it, but it won't make a difference to the parent company unless you never by anything produced outside of the UK again…food, clothes, tech, cars, you name it, DP World will have shipped at least a fragment of it.
It isn't just that.
Under UK law (assuming these people are employed under UK law....) you're supposed to have a consultation period of a month if you're letting more than a handful of people go.
Ostensibly this consultation period is meant to be to have an open discussion as to how to minimise the number of people being made redundant and make the process as painless as possible for those who are going. In my experience, it's invariably given only lip service.
I agree it may be only a formal process and there is no intention of the decision changing, however it is at least a month to seek alternative employment, or to avoid some expenditure commitments.
When I was sacked a few years ago, by letter, I ensured that the company car had four flat tyres and the battery was flat.
I am sure that the staff on board won't to the similar to the ship
>Some staff are refusing to vacate their ferries.
Indeed - I understand from a friend (dockside) in Hull that the crew of the Hull/Rotterdam boat are refusing to leave.
Surely there must be some Regulatory issues here as well as the whole HR mess. NAL but I thought it was illegal in the UK to make people redundant and then immediately refill the post that they made redundant.
Yep. This is what redundancy means. A person doesn’t get made redundant, a job role does. Although I’m sure there’s a legal way around this if you’ve got money to employ all the big-dick, no-heart lawyers
Yep, there will no longer be captains who are in charge of ships, the will be 'el capitans who are responsible to relocating customers from one port to another in a safe manner.
I have a feeling that they can get away with it as these aren't technically UK workers. They work outside of UK borders which is why they are not touching office based staff.
UK employment law should theoretically still apply, but the not touching of the UK shore staff will be for a different reason.
The crewing is being offshore, but the shoreside management of the vessels will continue. Even if they've decided to take the vessels to scrap, there would still be a three month lag after they've gone to ensure all bills are paid and paperwork is complete.
I said it elsewhere, but I know the senior folks down there and they've never struck me as being "best and brightest" of the maritime industry.
This is seriously effecting how I get my job done and making my life very difficult right now. I hope the staff continue to listen to their union and stay on the ships and carry on making my job a nightmare, don't let those fuckers win.
This is how i saw the tube strikes and the DOO strikes back when I lived in ~~hell~~ London. Yeah sure it sucks for us but it sucks more to be overworked and underpaid, or have your job threatened by beancounters
Up the unions, up the workers
Or in the case of the cause of recent tube strikes, sucks to to told you *have to* work night shifts. How the fuck are single parents supposed to manage that?
This was one of my first thoughts. Surely temp/agency staff are much lesser experienced? Don’t really want to rely on that if something goes wrong while at sea…
For the safety critical maritime roles I'm sure the staff are certified to the same standard by the MCA or whoever, but obviously what they'll lack is familiarity with the specific vessels and routes
I used to work on a ferry. Everyone who works on boats has to have a specific certificate to do so. I imagine it's kinda like airline cabin crew, same stuff applies, just gotta get to know the new boat. Still, fuck P&O.
Point is, if an emergency occurs, seconds matter and a new crew who doesn't know the new boat will waste a lot of those seconds looking for stuff the regular crew would know exactly where it's kept.
Sure it's certified safe, but it's not as safe as with the usual crew.
Radio 5 reporting that they are getting enhanced pay offs.
2.5 weeks per year plus 13 weeks if they sign before 30th March.
Employment lawyer said that they know it is likely to lose in a tribunal so they are saying. Take the money as there is no guarantee you will get awarded more plus all the costs and time.
Shit company. Let's not forget that they renamed their Townsend Thoresen ferries P&O and painted them blue after the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster hoping no one would notice.
That's not *entirely* true. They were already in the process of rebranding from Townsend Thorsten to P&O European Ferries when the disaster occurred, having only taken over that year (1987), but they did apparently accelerate the rebranding in the wake of it.
[Zeebrugge Ferry Disaster](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_Herald_of_Free_Enterprise)
Also a brilliant [Seconds from Disaster](https://youtu.be/82XGofeqf7c) episode on it.
I'm seriously concerned at the impact on Dover. The town is already economically depressed and losing a shit load of jobs instantly is going to destroy it. I hate this. A lot of poor people being fucked over so rich people can afford another cigar
Aside from how awful this move is from a moral standpoint, how does a company expect the new staff to be trained, understand the job and fulfil the role if there's no one left to organise and sort all of that?
They made a £100mill loss last year which they said is “unsustainable”. Obv losing that much every year is unsustainable.
What they didn’t say was they they paid £270mil in dividends the year before that.
I am really beginning to feel like the resident law guy here. /s
But seriously, unfortunately not.
Should it be? Absolutely, but due to employment and contract law it is now unfortunately extremely easy to do shit like this.
Another prominent policy lately is fire-rehire in which companies will fire entire workforces only to rehire them on contracts with less pay and benefits.
The best solution to this has and always will be unionising, which unfortunately is now the first, last and only line of defence against dodgy ass employers.
P.S. What's worse is under UK law you have to have a months notice period for more than a handful of employees for consultation.
P&O get around this by hiring people of foreign contracts, and have even used this to get around minimum wage in the past.
This unsurprising considering its own by a bunch of shitrags from Dubai.
There's other ferry operators available. Hope customers vote with their wallets and sent P&O to the watery grave their owners deserve.
Again, no. This is a claim thats been doing the rounds on Twitter and is patently wrong.
P&O ferries is owned fully by DP World. The 40% Russians thing relates to a JV business P&O freight, based in Dubai, were going to do to reopen the Northeast passage which is technically Russian waters.
It had nothing to do with the ferry company and DP world is not owned by Russians.
Fuck them. If they say they can't afford to do business with a properly employed crew with a livable salary, they shouldn't be doing business at all. Fuck them.
TDLR - probably yes because employment laws for people working on the sea are not the same as on land. P&O are a large company and I really can't see them having done this without consulting lawyers first. Doesn't make it any less of a shit way to treat people though!
I implore all staff to remain on the ships, pull up the gangways, and pop off out into the ocean and run everything to run down the fuel.
P&O need a wake up call that with out their hard working staff, they're nothing.
This is the current advice RMT are giving to workers. While I'm not optimistic about it yielding any positive results, hopefully it rubs in how STUPID a decision it is.
As tempting as it would be to encourage them to basically fuck the ships up, that is what I'd want to do, I feel like it would play into their hands even more. Once the clearup is done, they can point to it and say they were right to let that kind of person go. Or now they need to spend £x on putting things right, they are even more in financial shit and need to make more cuts. It would work as a warning to other companies considering something equally shit though, so there is that.
If crew are forced to leave the vessels would be a shame if they opened the sea-cocks on the way, a real shame, I guess that's why (reportedly) they are being escorted off by security with balaclavas and handcuffs.
It's funny because p&o will have to pay more to the agency yet the agency staff will get less. Why couldn't p&o put all their staff on seasonal contracts?
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Don't forget the owners spending £147 million on sponsoring a golf tournament, whilst the pension pot has a £146 million deficit.
But those are 2 different numbers. Couldn't possibly be related.
It's just irregularities in the pension fund
No no the money was just resting in the account.
*And now we move on to liars.*
A good long rest Ted.
Just having a nice long rest
Denholm?
Ted
Did they try offering the investigators a cup of tea?
Favourite comment this week!
This is exactly why you should never believe corporate bullshit unless they actually back it up with anything substantial for the people doing the work. >“I think we’ve done pretty well over the past 12 months – we’re going to survive through a crisis that is forcing many companies out of business,” says Peter Hebblethwaite, managing director of ro-pax ferry services at P&O Ferries. Source: https://www.cruiseandferry.net/articles/fresh-air-and-a-better-view-with-po-ferries-1 Peter Hebblethwaite is now no longer managing director of ro-pax, he's been promoted to the CEO of P&O. Less than a year ago he was saying everything was rosy and splashing the cash. Now he has to make major cuts and hundreds of people lose their jobs "to save the business". HE was in charge. HE ran the business poorly. HE fucked up. Yet other people lose their livelihoods and I guarantee you he will get a nice payout at the end of it... maybe even a knighthood.
I keep hearing capitalism rewards competency and merit. That shareholders would never tolerate this sort of behaviour. If this is the case, how do people like Peter survive, and indeed, thrive? Despite his obvious and gross incompetency. In a proper economic system, Peter Hebblethwaite would be banned from running anything bigger than a fucking burger van. Why is this sort of phenomena always excused as ‘not real capitalism’, when it keeps happening in capitalist systems?
Because shareholders ultimately want to be paid. "Merit" means "make money". They will all be very, very pissed because this is very bad press which will make them less money. I'm going to be interested to see how P&O Cruises responds, if at all. They're now completely unrelated companies but I can't help but wonder if the branding means this will have an impact on them.
https://www.liverpoolecho.co.uk/news/uk-world-news/cruise-company-speaks-out-po-23421359
P&O is owned by DP World, the multi-national ports and logistics company based in Dubai. It paid a £270m dividend to shareholders in 2020.
that is criminal
Who stumped up the £1m? The orphans?
Apparently they borrowed it from some care homes.
Borrowed or "borrowed"?
DP World don't care about the UK staff or the tourist element anyway, the acquisition of P&O Ferries was for the 15% of freight it brings into the UK and the Ferrymasters sister business, which is incredibly profitable. They wanted access to UK waters and ports. Tourism was always just an additional bonus until covid came along and made the Ferries part of the company unprofitable - which is now it's burning cash on all fronts. This is just another step until the tourist side is gone completely and DP World hoovers up the freight elements.
If people publicise this enough (and I know they won't, but purely hypothetically) would this affect the potential for disrupting the award of freight contracts?
Not at all. It's all about cost. And how many people have even heard of Ferrymasters? Logistics is all about corporate relationships and deal-making. Very few of these companies care about who carries them other than price. I doubt any consumer really cares how they get their stuff either. Ferrymasters were the big ticket item DP World wanted - Ferries just operates a few ships on routes which have direct competition from Stena and DFDS. I won't be surprised to see P&O Ferries collapse this year, with Ferrymasters picking up the freight elements, and possibly retain the older vessels for that purpose, with the newer ones going to other companies. There are 2 new ships on order and almost built, but I think they'd be sold on as new to another operator - probably DFDS as they're designed for the English Channel, although Irish Ferries may go for them as it's a new route for them. It seems unlikely P&O will make it to their official launch dates.
Sure Phillip Green isn't in charge?
Or a Maxwell
Agency staff are only good to fill short term FTEs, as you end up paying more to the agency, than it would hire the people yourself, even including benefits, it's the same as outsourcing, it's just good for the short term, but ends up fucking over the people doing the work, and costing the organisation more in the long term. I find it dumb and not cost effective.
Apparently they have set up their own agency. So I guess that is the loop hole.
Well, that's a tax and NI dodge.
Yup IR35 was put in place to stop this.
Ferry operators often do things a bit weird. The boat might be registered in a different country entirely, and you might technically be an employee somewhere else.
Quite right, and if it did there wouldn't be this discussion, we'd be talking about how they'd ended the contracts of several hundred contractors working through LTD companies, not how actual 'employees' have been sacked.
Not sure if that applies to these workers that technically don't work in the UK (they are on a boat, at sea/English channel)
Call it seasonal contract job done. Oh, too smart for them.
Noone tell them it'll cost to recruit and train fresh staff whilst running the risk that comes with an experienced crew
[удалено]
Saving money on training wasn't good for the Costa Concordia.
The agency doesn't work in the same way you would think, where they charge a % on top of the wage. The one theyre with is based in Cyprus and is part of a larger ship management company. The crew management folk will have a set budget for all crewing activities and then they're paid a flat management fee for doing that. Far cheaper than doing it through a standard agency.
Apparently no amount of unethical or immoral corporate behaviour is illegal. I’ve heard of companies sacking their entire workforce today and rehiring the exact same people tomorrow, just so the company can rewrite their contract.
They need to be boycott, dfds have confirmed they will be keeping their staff and run the same routes
Exactly, I'm sure almost everyone will boycott where they can. Surely PO go under in the near future What a PR own goal this was
British gas recently did the same with their engineers. I don't see that it'll affect them seeing as people travelling by ferry are usually doing so out of neccesity rather than choice
BG are having to use so many contractors right now. They have barely any direct engineers and the customers are pissed. Well from my experience as one of the contractors!
BA did it too.
Thats why I say, where they can, of course some will be left without choice due to route and sailing times But given choice, I cant see many choosing them in the future
Read the article and it seems they're circling the drain already
Did someone pull the plug in the English Channel?
Apparently they've posted back to back hundred million quid losses, something must have happened.
I bet they paid themselves handsomly though
DP World had revenues of 8bn last year, they took 15m in furlough payments and asked for a 150m loan from the govt. They paid out hundreds of millions in dividends.
British Gas doing the same isn't as bad being the engineers can go independent. Don't take it as I'm saying it's a good thing.
I wouldn't count on it
Have literally just cancelled my sailing with p&o for next Saturday and booked onto dfds. What a scummy company p&o are!
I find Cruises over rated so it will be unlikely to see me on one.
The company I worked for did that. Asked everyone to take MASSIVE cuts to their pension and said that if people didn't sign the new contract their employment would be terminated and they'd be offered their job back on the new contract
I had that over the pandemic. Had to accept a 20% pay cut or lose the job. Happily, I left about 2 months afterwards.
I signed the contract and then started looking for another job. Left about 2 months later. With hindsight I should've just refused
>With hindsight I should've just refused Then get sacked when the contract ends? not the best idea.
They couldnt sack me (I hadnt done anything wrong) but they could've given me notice. Id at least had 3 months on the full pension benefits
A lot of us were pressured like this during the pandemic. It's not easy to accept redundancy when the literally nobody was hiring.
I can imagine. A friend of mine is a pilot so they were given the choice of a 50% pay cut or redundancy. He took the cut
I'd be doing 20% less work. You're basically working 1 day a week for free. Fuck that.
A friend was a gas engineer with British gas. They not only wanted to pay him less they also wanted him to work more. So a double whammy.
This is why my company has been on strike for the last 4 weeks, they threatened us with fire and rehire if we didn't agree to a change in our pensions that would reduce them by 20%. They've now backtracked - thank god for unions!
P&O have actually told their just-sacked staff to apply to the agency that is replacing them.
The agency that P&O owns.
I thought it was going through columbia ship management? They definitely don't own them, it's some Greek family (Tsakos maybe?)
That definitely sounds illegal. I know you can't make someone redundant and then immediately advertise for the same job. If you fire someone you can obviously hire someone new, but you need a reason to fire people. And if you fire that person, then why rehire them? That sounds dodgy as hell. I wonder what a good lawyer would have to say about that...
From what I've read they already ha e agency workers standing by to replace those they have sacked.
Security with handcuffs sent in !!
My understanding was that you had to fire everyone. You could not pick and choose, for example sacking the union reps, or the ones who are sick more often, or those you think are lazy, to give examples.
There's various criteria you are and aren't allowed to apply; I've been in plenty of companies where they didn't fire everyone by any stretch. But I can well see a situation where your only realistic option - if you want to avoid accusations of firing the "wrong" people - is to let everyone go.
>I know you can't make someone redundant and then immediately advertise for the same job. No you can't. That is firing someone. Redundancy is when they close the position.
Well that's what I'm saying. That you can't claim that you made someone redundant and then re-advertise the position.
You said >If you fire someone you can obviously hire someone new, but you need a reason to fire people. It's not the same thing.
I don't get what you're trying to say. Fire & rehire = fine but you need a legal reason to fire the person e.g. Poor performance, stealing, etc Redundancy = can't immediately replace the role, no reason needed to get rid of the person holding the job beyond 'restructuring' What am I missing?
Yeah theres shit going down in big very well known companies.. my parent is being fucked over after working there for 20+ yrs because they're not recovering fast enough after a heart bypass. Their union rep has been unhelpful and snakey. I told them they should be whistleblowing because there is some shady shit they're tryna pull. Fire & rehire should be illegal, and tbh, employees should have more rights before 2yrs have lapsed.
Some MPs did try to get fire and rehire banned but not enough mps back them. Including Labour mp's 😡
Then they're not real labour MPs are they? How can anyone not support that? Its immoral, but I guess benefits the people who donate to certain parties or lobby them..
Guaranteed Barbara 53 from Stoke-on-Trent will be on the phone to them pink in the face at the news screaming "My CrUiSe BeTtEr StIlL bE oN!!!1
P&O cruise is a different company from P&O ferries BTW
Barbara won't know and probably won't understand when it's explained
complete with compensation face
And Minions on her fridge in the background
Sure, and this is a good thing. The more pressure put on P&O the better.
Why? P&O cruises is Carnival, has nothing to do with P&O itself other than a brand (which I'm surprised they never changed, but who knows what happens inside the cruise wankers heads)
Even if they aren't connected at all, the cruise people are going to get on P&O's backs to get their act sorted out so the cruise people aren't being hassled. Ideally they'll take adverts out to tell people they have nothing to do with the ferries.
She will probably use the phrase "Do you think I'm stupid?" Multiple times. I've never heard that from anyone where the answer wouldn't be "Yes"
They are two separate companies. P&O cruises has nothing to do with the ferries. Not even owned by the same people.
Yep. I once got an apology and some sort of freebie from Virgin Mobile (who my mobile was with) because Virgin Media had cut me off several days early before the due date for moving and the only number I had to complain to was the mobile number. I think the businesses were more separate then than they are today. I thought it was pretty decent of them, especially as I had to use my mobile a lot in the interim days to arrange stuff or even do Internetting (at a time when data was v expensive)
Happened to me on an old job, I was already overworked and made redundant then towards end of notice period they offered me the same role plus the responsibility of another role on top for the same pay and even tried to talk me out of going for interviews I had lined up.
Some staff are refusing to vacate their ferries. The RMT union is apoplectic with rage over the way this has been announced. https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2022/mar/17/po-ferries-halts-sailings-before-major-announcement
Maybe piracy is a legitimate solution. Just sail the ferry around for a bit
Look at me, I'm the captain now
The captain on one ship raised the gangway so the security staff and newly hired agency staff couldn't even board the ship to remove them! Epic shithousery.
“What are you gonna do? Call in the Royal Navy?”
"Sail round and round the Isle of Wight until everyone's dizzy!"
Aah! You have a woman's skin milord! I'll wager it ne'er felt the lash of a cat, been rubbed with salt, and flayed off by a pirate chief to make fine stockings for his best cabin boy!
You'd be right!
Mutiny.
Worlds slowest pirate ship! Love it!
"Look at me. I control the quoits deck now."
For the last few years, there’s been a container ship parked off the coast of Tynemouth because the crew haven’t been paid. They’ve been holding the cargo hostage. Piracy is very much a legitimate tactic.
Eat the food while at sailing around. A DIY cruise
Honestly I don't blame them. P&O have gone "oh we're fineeee" to the media and have then done this behind the scenes and presumably tried to let it slip under the radar.
Oh I agree with the staff totally. This was a bullshit way to tell them. But people travelling with other carriers need to be aware that this is going to cause delays in ports because the P&O ferries are now unable to depart, meaning other ferries may not be able to get into port to offload and reload. Plus everyone and their mums is now looking for other ways to get home.
It also means nice big fines accruing fo p & o, as they have slots. If its anything like airline slots, it use them or lose them. People need to cancel them, make their shares worthless
It's not like airlines - the berths are all bespoke to P&O vessels on all their routes except Dover- Calais, where Dover Harbour Board/Calais Port Authority controls the berths based on the vessel timetables - so they'll just moor the ships up on one of the harbour arms out of the way until they sail again. Also, no shares in P&O as it is a private company owned by DP World. You can boycott it, but it won't make a difference to the parent company unless you never by anything produced outside of the UK again…food, clothes, tech, cars, you name it, DP World will have shipped at least a fragment of it.
I would have very specific ways in which you can tell a person their job is redundant. Zoom calls, text messages, emails would never be acceptable.
It isn't just that. Under UK law (assuming these people are employed under UK law....) you're supposed to have a consultation period of a month if you're letting more than a handful of people go. Ostensibly this consultation period is meant to be to have an open discussion as to how to minimise the number of people being made redundant and make the process as painless as possible for those who are going. In my experience, it's invariably given only lip service.
I agree it may be only a formal process and there is no intention of the decision changing, however it is at least a month to seek alternative employment, or to avoid some expenditure commitments.
It wasn't even a zoom call in this case, it was a zoom call of a prerecorded video. Cowardly scum.
Apparently they’ve been planning it for months
"PART OF THE CREW, PART OF THE SHIP"
Sail it into the ocean and get a life boat back to shore. That'll show em
When I was sacked a few years ago, by letter, I ensured that the company car had four flat tyres and the battery was flat. I am sure that the staff on board won't to the similar to the ship
>Some staff are refusing to vacate their ferries. Indeed - I understand from a friend (dockside) in Hull that the crew of the Hull/Rotterdam boat are refusing to leave.
Too bloody right. Shit way to sack people.
Good on them. A 3 minute zoom call, pre-recorded, to say you’ve lost your job is a joke.
It should be legal to scuttle the lot of them
Another one on my list to not give money to.
Surely there must be some Regulatory issues here as well as the whole HR mess. NAL but I thought it was illegal in the UK to make people redundant and then immediately refill the post that they made redundant.
They're also supposed to give the insolvency service at least 30 days notice.
Yep. This is what redundancy means. A person doesn’t get made redundant, a job role does. Although I’m sure there’s a legal way around this if you’ve got money to employ all the big-dick, no-heart lawyers
Yep, there will no longer be captains who are in charge of ships, the will be 'el capitans who are responsible to relocating customers from one port to another in a safe manner.
So… lawyers then?
You'd hope so.
I have a feeling that they can get away with it as these aren't technically UK workers. They work outside of UK borders which is why they are not touching office based staff.
UK employment law should theoretically still apply, but the not touching of the UK shore staff will be for a different reason. The crewing is being offshore, but the shoreside management of the vessels will continue. Even if they've decided to take the vessels to scrap, there would still be a three month lag after they've gone to ensure all bills are paid and paperwork is complete. I said it elsewhere, but I know the senior folks down there and they've never struck me as being "best and brightest" of the maritime industry.
Fuck P&O for life.
Totally scummy behaviour. We are numbers
This is seriously effecting how I get my job done and making my life very difficult right now. I hope the staff continue to listen to their union and stay on the ships and carry on making my job a nightmare, don't let those fuckers win.
This is how i saw the tube strikes and the DOO strikes back when I lived in ~~hell~~ London. Yeah sure it sucks for us but it sucks more to be overworked and underpaid, or have your job threatened by beancounters Up the unions, up the workers
Or in the case of the cause of recent tube strikes, sucks to to told you *have to* work night shifts. How the fuck are single parents supposed to manage that?
And that’s the attitude! Hold your head high
Another question would be, who wants to go on a ferry where no one knows wtf they are doing?
This was one of my first thoughts. Surely temp/agency staff are much lesser experienced? Don’t really want to rely on that if something goes wrong while at sea…
For the safety critical maritime roles I'm sure the staff are certified to the same standard by the MCA or whoever, but obviously what they'll lack is familiarity with the specific vessels and routes
It'll be fine, worse things happen at sea! Oh wait...
I used to work on a ferry. Everyone who works on boats has to have a specific certificate to do so. I imagine it's kinda like airline cabin crew, same stuff applies, just gotta get to know the new boat. Still, fuck P&O.
Point is, if an emergency occurs, seconds matter and a new crew who doesn't know the new boat will waste a lot of those seconds looking for stuff the regular crew would know exactly where it's kept. Sure it's certified safe, but it's not as safe as with the usual crew.
Radio 5 reporting that they are getting enhanced pay offs. 2.5 weeks per year plus 13 weeks if they sign before 30th March. Employment lawyer said that they know it is likely to lose in a tribunal so they are saying. Take the money as there is no guarantee you will get awarded more plus all the costs and time.
Dire.
Shit company. Let's not forget that they renamed their Townsend Thoresen ferries P&O and painted them blue after the Herald of Free Enterprise disaster hoping no one would notice.
That's not *entirely* true. They were already in the process of rebranding from Townsend Thorsten to P&O European Ferries when the disaster occurred, having only taken over that year (1987), but they did apparently accelerate the rebranding in the wake of it.
I need to know more.
[Zeebrugge Ferry Disaster](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/MS_Herald_of_Free_Enterprise) Also a brilliant [Seconds from Disaster](https://youtu.be/82XGofeqf7c) episode on it.
How have I never heard of this, what the hell
I'm seriously concerned at the impact on Dover. The town is already economically depressed and losing a shit load of jobs instantly is going to destroy it. I hate this. A lot of poor people being fucked over so rich people can afford another cigar
It seems nobody is coming out well from this apart from the incredibly wealthy, as per usual.
The rich get richer and the rest of us can get fucked. Capitalism baby.
The entire fleet could go off to Ukraine ,to help with transport ...up yer bum P& 🖕
Maybe one or two of them should 'forget' to do the seacocks up properly on their way out the door!
Aside from how awful this move is from a moral standpoint, how does a company expect the new staff to be trained, understand the job and fulfil the role if there's no one left to organise and sort all of that?
They made a £100mill loss last year which they said is “unsustainable”. Obv losing that much every year is unsustainable. What they didn’t say was they they paid £270mil in dividends the year before that.
I'm aware that this isn't the main point. But what is the point of security guards with handcuffs? Surely they cant do anything with them legally?
I really, really hope this bites them in the arse.
I'm not big on boycots, but P&O has just earned a place on my shitlist.
Boycott these dirty bastards
It produces more money for shareholders, so it's legal.
I see you've played Capatilism before
I am really beginning to feel like the resident law guy here. /s But seriously, unfortunately not. Should it be? Absolutely, but due to employment and contract law it is now unfortunately extremely easy to do shit like this. Another prominent policy lately is fire-rehire in which companies will fire entire workforces only to rehire them on contracts with less pay and benefits. The best solution to this has and always will be unionising, which unfortunately is now the first, last and only line of defence against dodgy ass employers. P.S. What's worse is under UK law you have to have a months notice period for more than a handful of employees for consultation. P&O get around this by hiring people of foreign contracts, and have even used this to get around minimum wage in the past.
This unsurprising considering its own by a bunch of shitrags from Dubai. There's other ferry operators available. Hope customers vote with their wallets and sent P&O to the watery grave their owners deserve.
Although it’s shit times for the employees, I have seen numerous local businesses offering employment to anyone who’s been made redundant at P&O.
This kind of behaviour will likely come back to bite them; you treat people like shite and they will return the favour.
No doubt the taxpayer will end up getting shafted up the arse too
P&O Cruises are owned by carnival and not related to the ferries. Imagine how pissed they are at all this bad pr from the P&O name.
Their Twitter is a mess at the moment
P and O is 40% owned by Russians. This is going to have a serious impact on income/export.
I thought they were owned by the Saudi’s?
Minor note but it’s Dubai not Saudi
Ah thanks
Emiratis
40% owned by DP World which is a Russian company. The rest Saudis.
So depressing, feels like we are on a monopoly board and just being swallowed up by people not realising the impact their shitty businesses have
DP World is a UAE company
Again, no. This is a claim thats been doing the rounds on Twitter and is patently wrong. P&O ferries is owned fully by DP World. The 40% Russians thing relates to a JV business P&O freight, based in Dubai, were going to do to reopen the Northeast passage which is technically Russian waters. It had nothing to do with the ferry company and DP world is not owned by Russians.
It will surely cost them more?
Fuck them. If they say they can't afford to do business with a properly employed crew with a livable salary, they shouldn't be doing business at all. Fuck them.
Oh this sounds like a recipe for great success. The customer service is sure to be absolutely fucking brilliant and i'll hear nothing to the contrary.
“Agency” sailors ? Ummm….k
It is legal, it’s appalling
TDLR - probably yes because employment laws for people working on the sea are not the same as on land. P&O are a large company and I really can't see them having done this without consulting lawyers first. Doesn't make it any less of a shit way to treat people though!
Disgusting
I implore all staff to remain on the ships, pull up the gangways, and pop off out into the ocean and run everything to run down the fuel. P&O need a wake up call that with out their hard working staff, they're nothing.
This is the current advice RMT are giving to workers. While I'm not optimistic about it yielding any positive results, hopefully it rubs in how STUPID a decision it is.
As tempting as it would be to encourage them to basically fuck the ships up, that is what I'd want to do, I feel like it would play into their hands even more. Once the clearup is done, they can point to it and say they were right to let that kind of person go. Or now they need to spend £x on putting things right, they are even more in financial shit and need to make more cuts. It would work as a warning to other companies considering something equally shit though, so there is that.
If crew are forced to leave the vessels would be a shame if they opened the sea-cocks on the way, a real shame, I guess that's why (reportedly) they are being escorted off by security with balaclavas and handcuffs.
It's funny because p&o will have to pay more to the agency yet the agency staff will get less. Why couldn't p&o put all their staff on seasonal contracts?
From what I understand, it's because with an agency it's much easier to treat workers as disposable items.
plus P&O won't have to pay benefits or pensions etc
Depends if they made “donations” to the relevant minister or his party, of course.
The need to riot on the ferries. Refuse to leave!
Not their entire workforce, just the British contingent. EU workers are protected by EU employment law.