Billion- Pound Building Firms Blacklist Workers


The ICO said a secret system was run for over 15 years enabling employers to unlawfully vet job applicants.

Comments entered against individuals’ names included such entries as “lazy and a trouble stirrer”, “ex-shop steward… definite problems… No Go” and “Communist Party”.

They have always been at it

Those with any knowledge of how bitterly capitalists fight any kind of organised workforce will not be surprised that firms like Taylor Woodrow, Laing O’Rourke and Balfour Beatty used the blacklist created by “The Consulting Association” (full list at the bottomof article).

The Consulting Association ( Ran by Ian Kerr) is to be prosecuted under the Data Protection Act, but blacklisting, as such, is not a crime.

The Information Commissioner’s office has already said that the firms listed above will not face prosecution, just a warning that they will, maybe,next time they do it.

I bet that’s got them worried.

In fact, knowledge of the construction industry blacklist has been known since Alan Wainwright, a former director of Balfour Beatty subsidiary Haden Young, produced the lists as part of a constructive dismissal claim against his former employers in 2000.

Many of the workers, involved with major construction site disputes in the 1990’s (like the Jubilee line extension) found it impossible to get work.

During the 1980s Balfour Beatty’s then parent company, BICC, gave £90,000 to anti-union bosses’ organisations such as Aims of Industry and the Economic League.

The Economic League, was founded in 1919 by a group of industrialists and then MP William Reginald Hall under the name of National Propaganda. Its chief function was to promote the point of view of industrialists and businessmen.

They later worked with MI5 to blacklist workers who they suspected of association with certain left wing groups, ranging from the Communist Party of Great Britain to the Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament.

Mandelson said of the current scandal : “The information commissioner will need to look into this further to see whether these practices are more widespread and take the appropriate action” i.e. fuck all as far as he’s concerned.

Mandelson - Slimey as Ever (Nice one, Leila !)

I’m sure his obsession to sell off part of the Royal Mail has nothing to do with they are the UK’s most ready-to-strike workforce. Equally, I’m sure he’ll be getting very, very cross at the next dinner party he has with his business exec mates.

Full List of Blacklisting Firms :

* Amec Building
* Amec Construction
* Amec Facilities
* Amec Ind Div
* Amec Process & Energy
* Amey Construction – Ex Member
* B Sunley & Sons – Ex Member
* Balfour Beatty
* Balfour Kilpatrick
* Ballast (Wiltshire) – Ex Member
* Bam Construction (HBC Construction)
* Bam Nuttall (Edmund Nuttall)
* C B & I
* Cleveland Bridge UK
* Costain UK
* Crown House Technologies (Carillion/Tarmac Const)
* Diamond M & E Services
* Dudley Bower & Co – Ex Member
* Emcor (Drake & Scull) - ‘Ex Ref’
* Emcor Rail
* G Wimpey – Ex Member
* Haden Young
* Kier
* John Mowlem -Ex Member
* Laing O’Rourke (Laing)
* Lovell Construction (UK) – Ex Member
* Miller Construction – Ex Member
* Morgan Ashurst
* Morgan Est
* Morrison Construction Group –Ex Member
* N G Bailey
* Shepherd Engineering Services
* Sias Building Services
* Sir Robert McAlpine
* Skanska (Kvaerner/Trafalgar House)
* SPIE (Matthew Hall) - Ex Member
* Taylor Woodrow Construction – Ex Member
* Turriff Construction –Ex Member
* Tysons Contractors – Ex Member
* Walter Llewellyn & Sons - Ex Member
* Whessoe Oil & Gas
* Willmott Dixon – Ex Member
* Vinci PLC (Norwest Holst Group)