Striking union members will be told today of a proposed deal that could end the bitter row over foreign workers at Lindsey oil refinery in north Lincolnshire.

Marathon talks between union bosses and employers aimed at halting a series of wildcat strikes at the plant ended last night with the outline of a possible deal, believed to involve offering half the jobs at the disputed recruitment contract to UK workers.

Acas, the conciliation service, chaired yesterday’s meeting between union officials, representatives of Total, the French oil company which owns the refinery, and the Italian sub-contractor which has hired its own workforce.

Unions claimed that British workers had been excluded from the contract with Irem, which has brought about 200 Italian and Portuguese workers to the UK.

Acas said last night: “Conclusions are to be discussed with a large group of local trade union officials first thing tomorrow morning. This will be followed by a mass meeting of the workforce.”

National union leaders were waiting to see details of the formula, which is likely to be put to today’s mass meeting.

About 500 demonstrators gathered outside the huge Lindsey oil refinery again this morning, with more expected to join them throughout the day.

One worker said that they were waiting to hear from the strike committee before they knew if reports about a resolution to the dispute were true.

At one point the protesters gathered in a nearby car park to listen as a representative asked them to be patient.

Standing on the back of a flatbed truck, he said that they had been in talks until 8.30 last night.

Other demonstrators held up cardboard signs reading “Workers of the world unite” and claiming foreign workers at other sites were joining the strike in solidarity.

Derek Simpson, joint leader of the Unite union, said he understood that the proposed deal would see some of the disputed jobs go to British workers.

Speaking to the BBC Radio 4 Today programme, he added: “It will be jobs that are not yet filled. I don’t think there is any question of an Italian worker being sent home in favour of a UK worker.”

He stressed, however, that the proposal had to be discussed by the individuals involved in the dispute and he was still waiting to hear “the full details”.

The development came as the number of copycat strikes at power stations and other sites across the country rose once more in the increasingly bitter dispute.

Unofficial strike action at the Lindsey refinery has inspired a growing number of solidarity protests elsewhere, with around 500 workers at Shell’s Stanlow Oil Refinery in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, and 250 at Hartlepool engineering company Heerema joining the national walkout for the first time yesterday.

John Mann, the Labour MP for Bassetlaw, tabled a Commons early day motion “deploring” the use of foreign workers at the Lindsey refinery, and congratulating unions for “exposing this exploitation and the absence of equal opportunities to apply for all jobs”.

Total has been urging workers to end the unofficial action at the refinery in North Killingholme as soon as possible, stressing that it had never discriminated against British companies or British workers.

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