Scottish Power, Britain's biggest energy group, yesterday became the latest power company to back down in the face of threatened industrial action and scrapped plans to axe 300 engineering jobs over the next three years under a cost-saving programme.
The Glasgow-based group is also set to back down on a further 150 redundancies among clerical staff under the same programme to save £75m in operating costs in its heavily regulated electricity distribution business.
Unions led by the AEEU and TGWU hailed the move as the latest climbdown by power groups seeking widespread changes in staffing levels and employment contracts in order to counteract the squeeze on prices imposed by regulators. Northern Electric made a similar move last year.
The AEEU said it had won 90% backing in a ballot for a series of three-day strikes at Scottish Power this month and next in protest at the planned voluntary redundancies and changes to contracts of employment, including a cut in holiday entitlement by five days and no sick pay for the first three days of illness.
Dougie Rooney, AEEU energy officer, said: "This is a victory for common sense. We have avoided confrontation and now have an opportunity to work in partnership."
Union sources added: "We always argue that you can't guarantee safety and security of supply if you suddenly sack this number of staff."
The planned cuts in a workforce of 4,000 would have affected staff in both southern Scotland and north-west England and north Wales, where the group owns electricity company Manweb.
But company officials said the cost-saving remained on track and would be achieved by union agreement to greater efficiency, productivity and flexibility as the group tried to retain its leading position in the UK sector.
Scottish Power is one of the rare utilities to continue to enjoy City favour, and last month announced a £91m rise in pre-tax profits for 1999 to £736m. But following its $6.5bn acquisition of US power group PacifiCorp last year, it is increasingly looking overseas for future earnings growth.
