STUC General Secretary Roz Foyer criticised the Scottish Government and the companies involved within the ScotWind project, saying workers had been “ignored at every turn”.
The STUC also noted the lack of response by developers to its Fair Work survey, with only one of the 25 companies approached replying, and even then with only a partial response.
Ms Foyer said: “The findings of this report are deeply troubling. Offshore wind developers are being given a green light to flout the Fair Work principles that are supposed to ensure good jobs and fair treatment.
“Our survey to all ScotWind developers got no full responses and the experience of trade unions on the ground is resistance at almost every turn. The Scottish Government had the opportunity to set higher standards in the sector through the ScotWind leasing process but, in the year the Government themselves had pledged to make us a Fair Work Nation by 2025, ministers have left workers hanging in the wind.”
The report, which was commissioned to look into whether the wind sector in Scotland is set up to deliver social value and Fair Work, describes a sector characterised by fragmentation, job insecurity and “casualisation”, in which jobs are often hazardous. According to a 2024 international study, injury rates are four times worse in offshore wind than they are in oil and gas.
Though the ScotWind process, which auctioned leases to areas of Scottish waters for offshore wind development, did require bidders to submit a Supply Chain Development Statement, the fines for not meeting these commitments are, the report says, “low”.
It notes, too, that the process “included no specific requirements… with respect to worker representation, trade union engagement, or other aspects of job quality.”
One of the issues highlighted in interviews with STUC affiliates is the resistance of many companies to collective bargaining. Even some developers which have such agreements in older business divisions, such as retail, transmission and distribution, were, it said, “hostile to collective bargaining within their renewables arms.”
Scottish Power was highlighted as an example. “This,” said the report, “despite Scottish Power’s parent company Iberdrola having extensive collective bargaining agreements with employees in Spain. One interviewee mentioned speaking to Spanish colleagues who were ‘shocked’ that senior engineers working in Scotland would not be covered by collective bargaining.”
Equinor, too, though it has union representation in oil and gas, was viewed as “hostile on the renewables side in the UK”.
Interviewees also noted, it said, “an attitude, prevalent among company management, that renewables are a “new” or “dynamic” industry, for which they claim collective bargaining is not appropriate.”
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The union culture of oil and gas, with its historic deep roots, it found, had not been brought through to the renewables sector. “One interviewee,” said the report, “noted a reluctance of renewables employers to ‘import’ expectations on pay and terms and conditions from offshore oil and gas into renewables, which was a disincentive to move workers across sectors and therefore part of the wider barrier to achieving a just transition.”
Another spoke of an “elitist culture” in management, where they “do their own thing” and “don’t want other people coming in and criticising how things are done”.
But there were some positive examples of companies engaging with workers and unions: SSE, EDF and RWE, for instance, which have all reached an agreement to bring offshore wind workers under collective bargaining.
Orsted was cited as a good example, with a “recognition agreement that will cover all employees involved in the operation and maintenance of its UK offshore wind farms, although it does not extend to the supply chains and outsourced phases of development”.
Though many large multinationals were criticised, some interviewees also observed that their worker policies tended to be better than new market entrants “that are essentially investment vehicles rather than established energy companies”.
Part of the challenge, the report shows, is structural, with offshore wind projects fragmented across different tiers of subcontracting and in some cases complicated further by companies encouraging workers to work in quasi self-employment.
“A large number of subcontracting tiers,” the report said, “makes it harder for public bodies to implement conditions attached to licensing or public funding. For example, the SPV may commit to pay levels and terms and conditions that do not cascade down through the supply chain, or that extend only to their Tier 1 main contractors.”
Examples are given of worker exploitation by contractors within the industry, including payment below national minimum wage.
These include, for instance, a contract which shows the Fugro Scout Seafarer paying a worker below national minimum wage, and the Ben Nevis Seafarer, which was detained for failing to pay outstanding wages owed to its crew members.
As a result, the STUC is calling on the Scottish Government “to facilitate tripartite negotiations with trade unions and wind industry representatives” and “to set Fair Work and Just Transition conditions across leasing, planning applications, and public investment for offshore and onshore wind projects.
It also calls for the Scottish Government to “build greater public ownership of new energy projects at a national and local level to drive higher standards and rebalance ownership away from multinationals.”
ScotWind companies, the report notes, include five that are majority publicly owned by overseas governments, and 23 private companies.
Finally, the report calls on the Scottish Government to “ support reform of employment law to establish universal standards and minimum wage floors in the energy sector and create clearer structures for collective bargaining in the wind sector.”
Ms Foyer said: “It’s clear that without stronger government action and enforcement, Scotland’s renewable energy ambitions risk being built on a foundation of exploitation and inequality with workers concerns being ignored at every turn.
“That is something we cannot countenance and the recommendations of our report, which include the enforcement of Fair Work principles within the industry, a national stake in energy and wind projects and trade union access to the Scottish Offshore Wind Energy Council, must be actioned.
“If offshore wind is to be an opportunity to create good new jobs in the energy sector and reindustrialise our communities, it will require regulation, conditionality and a Scottish Government fully committed to their own principles of Fair Work.”
A ScottishPower spokesperson said: “Across all our business areas, our people are at the heart of what we do and we offer secure, well-paid, sector-leading employment benefits and conditions and regularly engage with our workforce and trade unions. We have a strong track record of resourcing our key projects across the UK, and have no concerns regarding resourcing Scotwind in 2030”.
Colin Palmer, Director of Offshore at Scottish Renewables, said: “The offshore wind sector is Scotland’s biggest economic opportunity and is already investing in people, the supply chain and local communities.
“ScotWind projects will be instrumental in delivering a successful energy transition by creating an abundance of career opportunities in areas like electrical engineering, vessel management and turbine maintenance.
“As we build more offshore wind farms, the renewable energy industry will work closely with key stakeholders including both the Scottish and UK Governments to ensure fair work principles are applied when securing the high-quality, sustainable, green jobs that will be needed to deliver Scotland’s future clean energy system.”
A Scottish Government spokesperson said: “We welcome this important research by the Scottish Trade Union Council and will consider the findings in further detail.
“The expansion of offshore wind represents a once-in-a-generation opportunity to create thousands of high-quality jobs. While employment law is reserved, we use the levers at our disposal to promote fair work practices across the labour market in Scotland, including in the offshore wind sector.”
