Naval yard strike action likely after job cuts announced

Unions
representing workers at three Navy bases are threatening strike action after
news that 750 jobs are to be lost and thousands more switched to private
companies.

Representatives
from unions representing the Naval yards at Devonport, Portsmouth and the Clyde
are gathering in London to discuss action.

Armed
forces minister Adam Ingram said the biggest cuts will occur at the Clyde base
in Scotland.

The
three bases currently employ 5,500, but 3,000 employees could see their jobs
switched to private companies in a deal designed to save taxpayers more than £300
million over the five years.

Jack
Dromey, national organiser at the Transport and General Workers Union, says his
members feel "utterly betrayed", and warns workers will not accept
compulsory redundancies.

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"If
ministers say to our members, ‘thanks for your past loyalty, here’s a
redundancy notice, here’s privatisation and no guarantees about job cuts, pay
cuts, conditions of employment, no guarantees against compulsory redundancies’,
then industrial action is inevitable," he said.

By Quentin Reade