Ferry operator P&O has been booted off the group bidding to make Cairnryan a green freeport.
Councillors backed a motion to exclude the firm from the move at Thursday’s full council meeting.
The firm has been heavily criticised after it sacked 800 workers – including staff on the Cairnryan to Larne route – last month.
Council leader Elaine Murray and depute Rob Davidson put forward a motion to express “disgust” at the firm for its actions and its intentions to use agency workers earning £5.15 an hour – considerably
lower than the legal minimum wage.
And they felt P&O Ferries and its parent company DP World had no place in the freeport bid as it requires those involved “to adhere to fair work practises including payment of the real living wage”.
Councillor Archie Dryburgh said the announcement of the sackings came the same day as the economy and resources committee met to discuss the freeport bid.
He said: “To come out of that meeting and to realise that had actually happened sickened me as a trade unionist and as a human being.”
Councillor Jane Maitland, a former P&O employee, said it was “not in the culture of that organisation” to have acted the way it did.
While agreeing with the sentiment of the motion, she questioned whether the impact of excluding them had been considered as P&O had already contributed to the bid.
Policy and performance advisor Andrew Reed admitted the ferry firm had invested around £20,000 in the bid and there would be the loss of their future financial backing.
But Councillor Murray said: “I would imagine we could argue that money was donated by P&O in the full knowledge this was a green freeport bid dependent on fair work practices.
“They have in a sense chosen to exclude themselves. They have caused this to happen by their actions.
“I don’t feel all that keen on giving them their £20,000 back if we could get away with not giving it back to them.
“I do not believe the Scottish Government or UK Government would countenance a bid with DP World and P&O.”
Councillor Ian Blake said he “wholly supported the motion” but asked for a slight deferral so officials could find out the full implications of excluding P&O.
He said: “I do realise
risks must be taken at times but this I think is an unnecessary risk.”
Councillors voted in favour of the original motion, including an addition from Councillor Willie Scobie acknowledging that P&O had admitted to a UK Government select committee that the company “have broken the law and would do it again”.
