Tata Steel on Friday said that it has reached an agreement with Dutch labour unions to resolve differences with the employees in the region, which had resulted in a strike in IJmuiden.

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As part of the agreement, the employment pact for employees in the Netherlands will be extended by five years and there will be no compulsory redundancies from the company’s transformation programme.

Henrik Adam, CEO of Tata Steel in Europe, said: “This agreement should give our employees the confidence that Tata Steel is fully committed to building a sustainable future for IJmuiden. We share an ambition with our employee representatives to restore IJmuiden’s position as the most competitive steel plant in Europe.”

Tata Steel’s Dutch operations were facing protests and demonstrations for over 25 days. The company’s employees at Ijmuiden had staged continuous strikes since June 10. The unions said that the company planned to scrap 1000 of the 9000 jobs at the site. The demands of the workers included agreements about job security, a robust strategic plan, ending the integration with Tata Steel UK and non-transfer of profits to Tata Steel UK.

The agreement with the union was reached late last night. Tata Steel’s Dutch management team, meanwhile, will discuss the transformation programme, and the resulting job losses with the local works council following a consultation process.

Hans van den Berg, Tata Steel’s IJmuiden hub director, said: “We are pleased to report we have reached an agreement with all unions. That is good news for Tata Steel, for IJmuiden and all of us. We held discussions late into the night yesterday and thanks to everyone's constructive attitude reached an agreement.”