Unite urge TATA Steel to wait until after election to resolve dispute
Indefinite strike action is set to begin on 8 July - four days after the General Election takes place
Unite are urging Tata Steel to wait until after Thursday's General Election is over to resolve an ongoing industrial dispute at its Port Talbot site.
Steelworkers in the union are set to begin indefinite strike action on 8 July following TATA's decision to close two blast furnaces, which will result in a loss of 2800 jobs.
In a new statement, Unite are urging Tata to consider the election results, and a possible change of government, before making a decision on the plant's future.
The company added that industrial action meant they could not guarantee "safe and stable operations" at Port Talbot.
The union say this stance gave them "no option but to exercise its mandate for industrial action."
"Unite has repeatedly requested that the company commit to not making any final decisions about the future of the blast furnaces until after the election when meaningful negotiations can be held.
"The only negotiations Tata want to have is to sell the jobs via redundancy packages. This is not acceptable.
"Instead of waiting for a likely change of Government, Tata has decided to double down, making continued threats and hiring city lawyers to try and stop industrial action on trumped up technicalities.
"If they are successful, Unite will re-ballot . We cannot allow these steel jobs to go.
"Unite will continue to do everything in its power to save jobs and fight to stop the destruction of our critical infrastructure."
Tata had previously the election, not its outcome, would impact "the timings or decision to proceed with winding down" the blast furnaces.