In its interim report, published today, the Committee said that it was “appalled” at the involvement of Sir Robert McAlpine, Skanska and Balfour Beatty in the Consulting Association (TCA), an organisation which compiled and operated a blacklist for construction workers for16 years. While the blacklist was not initially illegal, it was always morally indefensible, said the Committee and companies of all sizes continued to use it after blacklisting was outlawed. The Committee will be calling for more firms forward to give evidence, and will be investigating under the following broad headings: • Is blacklisting still taking place, both within the construction industry and more widely, and especially in Scotland? • Should compensation be paid, and to whom? • What penalties are appropriate for those firms and individuals who engaged in blacklisting and who benefited financially from the process, and is it appropriate to introduce a degree of retrospection? • Is the existing legislation against blacklisting sufficient, if properly enforced, or do we need changes to the law to eradicate the practice? Ian Davidson MP, Chair of the Committee, said: “We are appalled by what we have discovered during our committee hearings. The Consulting Association was an organised conspiracy by big construction firms, to discriminate against workers who raised legitimate grievances over health and safety and other industrial issues. “This was an exercise run for the financial gain of the companies involved and those who benefited must be held accountable. “We were neither convinced nor impressed by the attitude of the people involved in funding, operating and using this blacklist. The suggestion that this was somehow not a blacklist at all because people were not automatically refused employment if their name was on the list is ludicrous. "Thousands of workers and their family members, had intrusive, private information filed away about them so that they could be systematically discriminated against. Workers were denied employment without explanation, financial hardship was caused, lives were disrupted or ruined.”
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