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18th November 2010

NEWS IN BRIEF

A major construction contractor has been found guilty by an employment tribunal of blacklisting a prominent trade unionist.

On 10 November, at Ashford employment tribunal, an employment judge ruled that Unite member, Mr Phil Willis, had been unlawfully refused employment by CB&I because he is a member of a trade union, a prominent activist and was blacklisted because of this. He was awarded £18,375 in damages.

On 6 March 2009, the Information Commissioner's Office (ICO) raided the office of an organisation known as The Consulting Association (TCA) and found a list of over 3,000 workers in the construction industry.

It was discovered that a practice was operating whereby up to 40 firms in the industry were buying information on workers and blacklisting trade unionists. Mr Willis is a steel erector. He has been a member of Unite since 1968.

In 2007 CB&I were involved in a major engineering and construction project at the Isle of Grain. Mr Willis submitted an application to CB&I for work as a steel erector on the Isle of Grain project.

Although his application was acknowledged, he was not contacted again. CB&I were subscribers to TCA and used the services of TCA extensively.

Mr Willis obtained a copy of his intelligence file held by TCA which contained information about his trade union activity.

Following the raid by the ICO in March 2009, the government announced it would introduce legislation to outlaw blacklisting which became law in April 2010.

Unite had consistently argued that the blacklisting of construction workers was taking place.

Mr Willis brought his claim under different legislation (section 137 of the Trade Union and Labour Relations.(Consolidation) Act 1992) as there was no specific legislation outlawing blacklisting at the time of his claim.

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