P&O ferry bosses have admitted they broke employment law but had no option to sack 800 staff on the spot and replace them with cheaper crews .
Peter Hebblethwaite, the chief executive of P&O Ferries, stunned MPs by saying he would make the same decision again when confronted on the sackings in the Commons.
He made an apology to the crews dismissed and replaced with contract staff but said he had no regrets about breaking employment law by failing to consult with staff or trade unions before issuing redundancy notices.
The company boss said a proper consultation process with trade unions would have been a “sham”.
He told MPs: "We did not believe there was any other way to do this, a consultation process would have been a sham.
"I completely hold up my hands, our hands, that we choose not to consult.
“We did not believe there was any other way to do this and we are compensating people in full.”
MPs on the joint Business and Transport committee inquiry were left shocked by the admission as the P&O boss brazenly defied an attempt to be keel-hauled for what MPs called the “disgusting” decision to sack staff.
Hebblethwaite told MPs: “We did something that was incredibly difficult and controversial but we now have a business that can compete and grow.
“I am very sorry to these 800 people and their families but otherwise we would have lost an iconic British business.
"I know we would not be viable , if we hadn’t made radical changes the business would have closed and 3,000 people would have lost their jobs.”
MP demanded immediate action from government Ministers who also gave evidence on what they knew about the controversial sackings.
Robert Courts MP, the Maritime Minister at the Department for Transport, said the government would consider legal action in light of what had been heard.
He told MPs: “We are considering any options that are open to us and that’s why we’ve asked the insolvency service to look at this.”
“We obviously have to act within the law, we have, to investigate properly, we have to understand what the position and what our legal powers are and then if there is something that’s open to us, we will look at it.”
Huw Merriman MP, chair of the transport committee demanded more urgency.
He asked Courts: “Do not feel this is a situation so appalling in terms of what we’ve been told today, that a big companies just decided to opt out of the laws of this country, that it warrants immediate action, not consideration, not the Insolvency Service having a think until April 8th, but immediate action today?”
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