Chamber and committees

I will just push you on that point, if you do not mind, Mr Hebblethwaite. Just for absolute clarity, you are telling the committee that there are no strategic plans, whether in draft or finalised, to do anything to the land-based staff at Cairnryan—is that correct?

That is not your only duty, is it, Mr Hebblethwaite? As a company director, you have fiduciary and legal duties. What I asked was whether you consider yourself to be a fit and proper person who is discharging not merely the duty that you just mentioned but the full raft of fiduciary duties for your company, given that you wilfully and knowingly took a decision to offend against one of the strongest laws that Parliament has put in place.

Yes, but have you not just said that you would have ignored any such order from a tribunal?

Mr Hebblethwaite, I understand that there are a number of land-based employees of P&O, many of whom are based at Cairnryan. Does P&O have any strategic plans, whether finalised or in draft, that would impact on those employees in some way? Obviously if they are to be restructured, transferred under the Transfer of Undertakings (Protection of Employment) Regulations, or dismissed, they will be legitimately concerned.

Thank you. Moving on, I will direct follow-up questions to Grant Tierney and the two Ians at the CITB.

In answer to the last question, Gordon Nelson talked about the need to develop a plan or a co-ordinated strategy. The Scottish Government and Skills Development Scotland published a climate emergency skills action plan in December 2020, which presumably aims to achieve what Gordon has rightly suggested that we need to achieve. That begs the question: what engagement have your organisations had with the action plan? Are any of you on the implementation group, for example? In your view, is the plan on track to ensure that the necessary skills are in place to support our transition to a net zero economy? If not, who needs to act and what needs to happen?

That is for Grant Tierney first.

Thank you, Grant. That was an interesting answer. As a part of that, do you have any comment on the climate emergency skills action plan from December 2020? How has that impacted your organisation? Most importantly, is the plan on track, as far as you are aware?

I am very grateful. I pose the same question to Ian Hill.

Good morning, Mr Hebblethwaite. P&O accepts that UK employment law was not merely broken but fundamentally offended. You are paying out £36 million in settlements to make that acceptable to the employees. I presume that the settlements needed to include—per employee—notice, holidays, a settlement sum, an aggravation uplift and a 90-day collective consultation award. There must also be an up-front cost per month for the agency supply workers. What is the cost of the agencies? How long do your projections show that it will be before P&O breaks even on the settlement sums, agency fees, legal fees and management time, so that the decision makes commercial sense?

Good morning. My first question is for Gordon Nelson and Martyn Raine. We have heard about the need to create around 22,000 jobs, and Gordon Nelson talked about the need to upskill the current workforce. In evidence to the committee, SDS described the current labour market as “hot”, by which I think that it meant that there is a high demand for labour and a shortage of labour due to things such as the pandemic. Are there already skills or labour shortages? If so, how are they impacting on your members and their operations as well as on the planning for the upskilling that you have talked about?

That seems to me to be the crucial point, but it begs the question: if a clear plan is required to implement the climate emergency action plan, who will drive that? Who is the onus on to create the clear plan that it sounds as though you are all desperate for?