Workers to stage walkout for second day running
HUNDREDS OF workers are due to walk out for the second day running on a huge construction site in Hull.
Work on the £200m Energy Works site in Cleveland Street stalled yesterday after workers manned a picket line in protest over issues including fire alarms.
It follows a walkout last week by about 280 of the 480-strong workforce over concerns about alarms not working or being inaudible on the site.
Shaune Clarkson, GMB regional organiser, said he and Unite union representatives were due to meet clients and contractors this morning and they would put a proposal on the table.
He said: “We will be meeting at 7am and I am expecting the men to do a peaceful demonstration as they have done today.”
Workers outside the site yesterday alleged that problems with the alarms had not been resolved and expressed frustration that minor but “niggling” issues like broken toilets and cabins with no drying gear had been raised through the proper channels to no avail.
Mr Clarkson said as far as he was concerned the site was safe.
He said: “There’s a build-up of issues that has gone on for too long and the alarms was the straw that broke the camel’s back.”
He said four additional alarms had been fitted on the site on Monday.
Principal contractor Stuttgartbased M+W Group was unavailable for comment.
However following last Thursday’s walkout, Energy Works (Hull) Ltd issued a statement saying an independent health and safety audit “confirmed the site is being operated and controlled in a safe manner”.
It added that M+W Group “anticipates a swift resolution to this matter, which will see the full resumption of works on site.”
The plant, which sits alongside the river Hull, was granted a permit last year from the Environment Agency to take a maximum of 315,000 tonnes of waste a year, including black-bin “residual” household waste, commercial and industrial waste and waste wood.
A technology called fluidised bed gasification will convert the waste into a gas which turns a turbine to create electricity.