Call for urgent support as highly-skilled workers could lose jobs at Nottinghamshire firm

Thousands of job losses at an iconic Nottinghamshire firm are a ‘stark reminder’ that the manufacturing industry needs urgent financial support – a union has warned.
Thousands of jobs are set to be cut at Rolls Royce in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.Thousands of jobs are set to be cut at Rolls Royce in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.
Thousands of jobs are set to be cut at Rolls Royce in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic.

Rolls Royce has now confirmed that 2,000 of its UK workforce are to leave the company in August.

The firm operates two major plants in Nottinghamshire and Derbyshire, employing hundreds of people in the area.

Unite has said the number of workers being shed by Rolls Royce is a reminder of the lack of comprehensive financial measures to help manufacturing through the coronavirus pandemic.

Unite national officer for aerospace Rhys McCarthy said: “The job losses at Rolls Royce are a stark reminder that these are highly-skilled jobs that the UK economy can ill-afford to lose as it faces the economic realities of the post-pandemic world.

“Unite has called for a set of measures for manufacturing in the short to medium term, such as short term working, that our economic competitors France and Germany have already adopted.

“Unite has also repeatedly called for a comprehensive industrial strategy to underpin the UK’s manufacturing base as it goes through the Covid-19 emergency. What we are seeing instead is a series of tactics trying to delay the inevitable rather that a thought through sector based strategy to help rebuild and recover.

“Many of the factories and plants that make up the manufacturing base are in the very communities and regions, such as the north, that Boris Johnson promised would be at the heart of his so-called ‘levelling up’ agenda.

“Chancellor Rishi Sunak can no longer ignore the continuing plight of manufacturing – the future of the UK economy can’t be just based on services, consumer consumption and a cheap meal out.

“Yesterday’s £30bn mini-budget from the chancellor was centred on the consumer side of the economy and the needs of manufacturing were by-passed.

"The offer for firms of a £1,000 bonus for every furloughed worker taken on until January next year is, quite frankly, tinkering at the edges.”