A DESPERATE attempt is being made today by Government officials to prevent skilled Jarvis jobs leaving the railway industry forever.

Three major track renewal companies pitching for work which would otherwise have been done by the ill-fated York-based group have been asked to turn up today at events designed to help the firm’s 1,200 redundant workers, including 350 in York.

The all-day events, funded by regional development agency Yorkshire Forward in partnership with Job Centre Plus and the Skills Funding Agency, will offer redundancy, training and job application advice to the men, some of whom were owed five weeks wages when their company went into administration last week.

Government officials want representatives from Babcock, Amey Colas and Balfour Beatty to use the events to offer redundant Jarvis workers face-to-face advice on how they can share in the work, should they win the contracts.

One of the advice venues is at the new Yorkshire Rail Academy, next to the National Railway Museum, in Leeman Road, York.

But Bill Rawcliffe, York’s RMT union branch secretary representing Jarvis workers, described the move as a “scandalous sham”, designed to circumvent the men’s wages, pensions, terms and conditions.

He said: “Tupe – the Transfer of Undertakings Protection of Employment – should apply here, rather than allowing these firms to give the impression that they can pick and choose which of us will get the jobs that are rightfully ours.”