GRANGEMOUTH workers have slammed Labour's £1 billion pledge to INEOS chairman Jim Ratcliffe to redevelop Old Trafford while he closes the refinery.
Last week, Chancellor Rachel Reeves gave her backing to Ratcliffe, who part-owns Grangemouth, for a multi-billion pound revamp of Manchester United’s stadium and surrounding area.
Workers at the Grangemouth oil refinery near Falkirk were then handed redundancy notices by Petroineos, a joint venture between Ratcliffe's firm and PetroChina, days later. It is expected that more than 400 jobs will be lost.
The refinery, which was one of only two in Europe, could close as soon as May – just three months from now.
Ratcliffe's project could receive £1bn of taxpayer money to create housing and transport infrastructure including the possible relocation of an entire cargo rail network.
Kenny MacAskill, former justice secretary and acting Alba leader, said: “Starmer’s Labour are showing their true colours. It’s Ratcliffe's Man Utd over Team Scotland. Never mind millions for Antwerp when Grangemouth is to close.
“It’s perverse that Scotland is being deindustrialised while an area around a football stadium, already owned by a billionaire, is going to be redeveloped using potentially a billions pounds of public money.
“Scotland’s oil should be refined in Scotland and Scotland’s oil riches should benefit jobs and businesses in Scotland - not fund an English fitba club owned by a billionaire.”
Falkirk’s Labour MP Brian Leishman said: “It’s a nonsense. Scotland at the heart of Government? I can’t even get a meeting with the Chancellor.
“This is the first test and the Government has failed miserably."
He added: “I requested my meeting in December and despite repeated chasing up I am still waiting.
“This is the level of contempt they have for one of their own colleagues.”
Leishman (below) continued: “The UK Government announced a £100 million one-off growth deal for Scotland on the back of what is happening with Grangemouth. Despite giving £600m loan guarantees to Ratcliffe for a factory in Belgium.
“What [Scottish Secretary] Ian Murray is not telling you is that £80m of that £100m was already given by the previous Tory Government.
“The Scottish Government fired in £10m and the UK Government has fired in £10m. That won’t even touch the sides for something that is worth £403.6m per year to the Scottish economy.”
Former chairman of the trade union contractors group at Grangemouth between, 1999 and 2009, Robert Buirds told The Sunday Mail: “The skills base we used to have are being depleted, particularly because the shipyards have mostly all gone.
“You’ve got John Whittaker who runs the Peel Group on the west coast and Ratcliffe on the east coast. It’s like two billionaires playing monopoly with Scotland and nobody is doing anything about it.
“The politicians do not care. They’re all careerists with no interest in what ordinary people are going through.”
Scotland Office Minister Kirsty McNeill (above) defended her party’s actions, and said: “The first and most important thing to say is a period of uncertainty and potential redundancy for workers is always unbelievably stressful.
“My heart is with those workers.
“The reality is before July there was no plan for Grangemouth. We have been in since July, and the minute we were behind our desks, we focused on a few different things.
“First of all, making sure that relationship with the Scottish Government works so that we can come up with a joint plan for that site and those workers.
“Secondly, that £100m package for the local area to make sure that the community is invested in and the workers are, to a degree, protected.
“And thirdly, Project Willow, which got £1.5m to think about a sustainable future for the site.
“Nobody thinks that sort of effort could be done and dusted within weeks or even months. But we are absolutely committed to making sure that there are long term answers.”
