Carillion chief executive Richard Howson has apologised for the company’s role in blacklisting activities and promised it will never happen again.
A total of £10m has been paid out in compensation so far to building workers who were blacklisted for their union membership. The final compensation bill could reach £75m, according to Unite the Union.
Richard Howson, in an interview with Sky TV, said: “With Carillion, we apologised for those activities three or four years ago. It was a subsidiary of Carillion which was sold in 2004, and the issues are now resolved.”
He added: “Certainly for Carillion there is no way those activities would take place going forward.”
However, speaking to Construction Manager, Howard Beckett, director of legal services for Unite, said: “For Unite members, this was an extremely contentious litigation, everything had to be extracted from the construction companies, nothing was given in good faith and had to be got under duress from litigation.”
The blacklist was used by some of the biggest construction firms, including Balfour Beatty, Carillion, Costain, Kier, Laing O’Rourke, Sir Robert McAlpine, Skanska and Vinci.
It resulted in hundreds of workers losing their jobs and being unable to secure new ones after being deemed troublemakers while raising legitimate workplace issues.
The compensation deal was agreed with Unite, which represented 97 workers, who will receive payouts of between £25,000 and £200,000. The agreement was reached ahead of a planned High Court hearing.
