URTU in 'sacking' row
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by Sally Nash • Hythe-based Dockspeed is taking legal action against claims by the United Road Transport Union that the company threatened to sack one of its drivers who refused to take his truck to strikebound France.
The row erupted last week when URTU issued a statement claiming Dockspeed had told a driver who refused to go to France to "clear your cab and report for disciplinary action".
According to URTU, the union stepped into the fray when the driver asked it for advice. But Dockspeed insists there is no truth in the allegations. Managing director Andrew Ingleston says that when the driver explained that he did not want to go to France, he was advised to clear out his cab because the vehicle would be needed on other work. The driver was not told to report for disciplinary action but to turn up for a job, claims Ingleston.
"This is a driver who has worked for us for threeand-a-half years, who has an exemplary disciplinary record, so we respect his point of view," says Ingleston. He adds that the matter is in the hands of his solicitor and that he is demanding a full apology and retraction from URTU.
However, a spokesman for the union, says: "We have sufficient evidence— from the driver and independent witnesses—and we do not intend to retract anything." • A meeting will take place on 17 December between the general council of the Trades Union Congress and United Road Transport Union as a long-running inter-union battle moves into its next stage. The dispute began when disillusioned Transport and General Workers Union members at Ford, angry about the way the union had handled a racial discrimination issue, asked to join URTU. But the TUC instructed URTU to either encourage the Ford workers to rejoin the TGWU or face a £36,000 fine.
An URTU spokesman says that it will put forward its case at the December meeting but, if the union is suspended, it will take its case to congress next year. 'What the 11.1C is saying is that you cannot join another union, no matter how badly you are treated, without the consent of the first. This is not a negotiable situation—we are not prepared to change our principles simply because somebody does not like what we are doing."