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The staff at the mobile phone company O2 have voted in favour of industrial action as part of a row over trade union recognition. The Communications Workers Union (CWU) said O2 was refusing to recognise the union for collective bargaining purposes although it did represent individual staff in grievance and disciplinary proceedings.

CWU's head of organising and regulatory affairs Ian McArdle saidg that the union had engaged with the company over the last year in a change process but that afterwards it had been cast adrift. He said the company in Ireland was also failing to live within a global agreement signed by UNI and the Telefonica group, which acquired O2 in 2006, to recognise unions and safeguard labour rights.