P&O: Agency worker describes Cairnryan 'mystery bus tour'

An agency worker brought in at short notice to replace sacked P&O Ferries staff said he turned and left when he realised what was going on.

Mark Canet-Baldwin, from Hull, says he was hired a week ago and was kept in the dark about the ship he would be on.

After a "mystery bus tour" from Glasgow to the P&O dock in Cairnryan with security staff in tow, Mr Canet-Baldwin said he worked out the situation.

"I couldn't look my kids in the eye if I did something like this," he said.

P&O said it was a "tough" decision to sack 800 workers without notice but it would "not be a viable business" without the changes.

Protests against the move are due to be held on Friday at the ports of Dover, Hull. Liverpool and Larne.

Mr Canet-Baldwin, who's originally from Australia and lives in Welton, said he was hired to work as an onboard services manager after seeing a job advert on Facebook, but the agency couldn't tell him anything about the vessel.

He was put up in a hotel on Monday in Glasgow with training staff and was driven at 05:30 GMT on Thursday to an undisclosed location, which turned out to be Cairnryan.

"We thought it was a new ship and it was going to be launched with some hurrah," he said.

'Conscience played up'

A fellow agency worker had been employed on P&O's European Highlander vessel three weeks earlier and called a contact who worked on the ship once they spotted it in the dock.

"They told us they'd all been sacked, we could hear one young lady in the background in tears, poor thing, she'd got a mortgage last week," Mr Canet-Baldwin said.

"We heard of guys doing normal things, hoping to buy cars or get ready for the summer, everyday normal things, and they were just devastated."

Agency workers were driven to the European Highlander vessel, which was docked at Cairnryan

Mr Canet-Baldwin said a number of agency workers then walked away, adding: "My conscience started to play up and I thought, 'what are we doing?'

"We're not just going to crew a vessel, we're taking these people's jobs - I just came to the decision that I couldn't do it."

He says he took off his hard hat and overalls and, along with three others, got off the bus and went home.

The government said it would review its contracts with P&O Ferries, with unions calling it a "dark day" in the shipping industry.

Discussing the decision to lay-off 800 workers, P&O Ferries said: "We have made a £100m loss year-on-year, which has been covered by our parent DP World. This is not sustainable.

"Without these changes there is no future for P&O Ferries."