BREAKING: 800 staff lose jobs IMMEDIATELY after P&O Ferries reveal HUGE losses

BREAKING: 800 staff lose jobs IMMEDIATELY after P&O Ferries reveal HUGE losses.

IT has been a day of turmoil at P&O Ferries after it was revealed earlier on Thursday, March 17 that the company would be making major redundancies, sadly it has now been announced due to HUGE losses, 800 staff will be losing their jobs with immediate effect.

The events kicked off on March 17 when all sailings were suspended ahead of a major announcement from the company.

Rumours circulated that the company, which has 20 ships, would be going into liquidation, however, it was later announced that all of its 3,000 workers would be sacked.

However, since then, the company has finally released a statement confirming that 800 staff would be made redundant. The company also revealed the significant losses suffered by one of the UK’s largest ferry operators.

A P&O Ferries spokesperson said: “We have made a £100m (€119m) loss year on year, which has been covered by our parent DP World. This is not sustainable. Our survival is dependent on making swift and significant changes now. Without these changes there is no future for P&O Ferries.

“These circumstances have resulted in a very difficult but necessary decision, which was only taken after seriously considering all the available options.

“As part of the process we are starting today, we are providing 800 seafarers with immediate severance notices and will be compensating them for this lack of advance notice with enhanced compensation packages,” as reported by the Mirror.

Upon the initial announcement of staff being sacked, Shehab Khan of ITV said on Twitter: “Understand that all sailing staff at P&O Ferries have been made redundant with immediate effect. The company will use an agency to keep their ferries running and current staff will be able to apply to the agency for work.”

Transport Secretary Grant Shapps said: “I am very concerned about the news from P&O Ferries this morning and we will be speaking to the company today to understand the impact on workers and passengers.

“Important to note other operators continue to run cross Channel routes, so passengers and goods can flow, but I am working with the Kent Resilience Forum to minimise disruption.”

After the announcement of the redundancies, the Nautilus union chief said: “The news that P&O Ferries is sacking the crew across its entire UK fleet is a betrayal of British workers. It is nothing short of scandalous given that this Dubai owned company received millions of pounds of British taxpayer’s money during the pandemic.

“There was no consultation and no notice given by P&O. Be assured the full resources of Nautilus International stand ready to act in defence of our members. We believe it is in our members’ best interests to stay onboard until further notice.”

https://twitter.com/KarlTurnerMP/status/1504434461538230272

Fears that P&O Ferries were going into liquidation were shot down by the company before the shocking news of staff redundancies was announced.

“P&O Ferries is not going into liquidation. We have asked all ships to come alongside, in preparation for a company announcement. Until then, services from P&O will not be running and we are advising travellers of alternative arrangements,” a spokesman for the firm said.

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