February 5 2008

Maersk North Sea oil platform Janice has been closed by the British Health and Safety Executive due to major safety problems. Workers who criticized safety have been blacklisted, OILC union alleges.  

Maersk Oil has come in for hard criticism from the British Health and Safety Executive. The HSE told Maersk that the Janice platform should remain shut down until a catalogue of serious safety failures has been fixed.

Lack of maintenance

Specialist publication Upstream has reported that, according to minutes from a meeting between the HSE and Maersk Oil senior management which it has seen, the British safety authorities are not at all pleased with the company’s safety performance:

“Maersk seems to have put the emphasis on a profitable project against a positive safety culture,” the Danish newspaper Borsen quotes HSE-inspector Dave Walker as saying, according to the minutes.

The HSE served a prohibition notice for the field installation on November 15, and Maersk Oil has no current plans for starting up production again.

Half of all platforms in poor condition

The HSE referred to more than 40 areas on Janice of where maintenance was outstanding. It also noted that lifting operations were poorly controlled.

Within the same week the HSE released a critical report showing that half of all oil instalkations in the UK North Sea needs safety improvements.

Maersk took over the Janice from previous operator Kerr McGee in July 2005.
In mid-August 2007 the platform suffered gas leaks and production has been below 100 per cent since then.
 
Critical workers kicked out

At the same time Maersk is being accused of blacklisting workers who raised safety issues on Janice.  At least three employees have lost their jobs there in the past few months because of blacklisting, according to the oil union OILC, which represents some of the workers on the platform.

“Many of the issues mentioned by the HSE have also been raised by our members. They have tried to improve safety on the installation, but because of that, they found themselves at the wrong end of a blacklist,” Jake Molloy, general secretary of the OILC said.

The workers were employed by the contracter Petrofac and had been working on the platform for several years.

Maersk denies blacklist

Maersk Oil denies that any kind of blacklist has taken place.

“On the contrary we encourage our employees to discuss safety on all platforms. We do not black list anyone for raising safety issues,” Maersk Oil UK managing director, Michael Engell-Jensen says.

“It is the policy of Maersk Oil to give safety first priority, and the Janice oil and gas production will remain shut down until production can be safely resumed.” Michael Engell-Jensen states.

Maersk Oil has set up an internal Taskforce to solve the problems at ‘Janice.’