ABSTRACT
The formal rupture of OILC with the established unions had occurred at the tail end of 1991. This chapter analyses the conflicts and tensions that arose both within OILC and between OILC and the established unions from 1991 to 1995. The first months of 1992 were occupied by the construction of a framework for OILC that would satisfy the demands of the Certification Officer for documentation of the organization’s activities as a bona fide union. More importantly, a new membership structure which provided for internal democracy had to be created. By early February 1992 OILC had obtained an official listing as a trade union, thus initiating a two-year ‘probationary’ period prior to achieving its full Certificate of Independence. The immediate requirements facing OILC were to put together a rule book and constitution, and to hold a national conference at which these could be adopted and office bearers selected. In the period following the OILC’s foundation as a union, the most urgent task was to recruit the volume of membership that would make the union a sustainable financial entity. After the first flush of over 200 new members, recruitment had been slow, although steady. Over the first months at the turn of the year, there was a period during which OILC teetered precariously on the brink of financial collapse. OILC activists, in the main those still ‘blacked’as a result of the action, had daily canvassed offshore workers travelling to and from the rigs at the main railway station in Glasgow with membership recruitment leaflets and Blowouts. By March, membership had reached the 1000 mark and the union had secured basic financial viability. For the first time ‘drill hands’ on exploration rigs had joined up with the union, giving some credence to OILC’s claims to industrial unionism, although the numbers involved were still very small. On three drilling rigs, the Borgny Dolphin, the Sedco 710 and the Ocean Alliance, recruitment had taken place. On a few installations such as the Claymore, which had retained its organizational infrastructure relatively intact during the 1990 action, OILC members constituted the majority of active trade unionists on the platform. On the Claymore, total membership reached 114 and covered all departments including over 30 electricians, about 48 engineers and scaffolders, some 14 painters, a dozen pipefitters and several welders, riggers, platers, roustabouts, mechanical workers and the helideck crew. OILC was to claim, accurately if somewhat grandiosely, ‘In the twenty-five year history of the offshore oil and gas industry, no single union has made such a comprehensive penetration of a single installation.’ 1
