Call for cash as carmakers close for Christmas
A UNION leader from the region has made fresh calls to the government for a £13bn loan to the car industry, as production lines close for Christmas.
Tony Woodley, joint general secretary of Unite, has again called for the short-term industrial loan to help the car industry weather the current economic storm.
“It is vital that we hear some reassurance from government that car manufacturing will not be allowed to pay the price for the recklessness of the banks. Government needs a clear, forceful strategy to support the industry through these tough times or we will see companies jettisoning workers,” he said.
“The stakes are that high. Viable, well-managed companies who are struggling simply because the supply of credit has dried up will go to the wall unless short-term state support is made available, just as it has been in Germany and is expected to be in the US.
“When the economic downturn looked likely to wreck our banks, the government did not hesitate to act. They moved quickly to take a stake in the banks and help shore up confidence in the financial sector. Manufacturing and the hundreds of thousands of people who depend on it for a job in this country need them to be just as strong and clear now and intervene to support industry.”
His call comes as the Vauxhall plant at Ellesmere Port, which employs 2,200, prepares to close for a month.
The plant usually closes on Christmas Eve, but this year is starting the break 12 days earlier, because of the slump in car sales. The plant also ceased production for 16 days in October and for a week in November.
And today is the first day of a month-long shutdown at Bentley Motors in Crewe, with the 3,800 staff taking 19 extra days on top of the usual Christmas break.
Meanwhile, Jaguar Land Rover, which employs more than 2,000 people at Halewood, had a non-production week at the beginning of the month. It also closed for a week at the end of October to try and ease over-capacity.
