JAGUAR workers have been put on a three-day week until Christmas! This affects as many as half of the two thousand workers at its Castle Bromwich plant in Birmingham who have been moved from a five to a three-day week.
JLR (Jaguar Land Rover) claimed in a statement it was standard business practice to ‘regularly review its production schedules to ensure market demand is balanced globally. ‘In light of the continuing headwinds impacting the car industry, we are making some temporary adjustments to our production schedules at Castle Bromwich.’
JLR continued: ‘We are however continuing to over-proportionally invest in new products and technologies and are committed to our UK plants in which we have invested more than £4 billion since 2010 to future proof manufacturing technologies to deliver new models.’
Unite assistant general secretary Tony Burke said: ‘This is the continuing effect of the chaotic mismanagement of the Brexit negotiations by the government which has created uncertainty across the UK’s automotive industry and the manufacturing sector generally.
‘It is also the result of the mishandling of how the UK makes a just transition from diesel and combustion engines to electric vehicles. Both issues have damaged the “jewel in the crown” of UK manufacturing – our automotive industry.
‘The government’s failure to grasp the needs of the automotive industry were further highlighted when prime minister Theresa May recently unveiled a £106 million funding package for the research and development of zero-emission vehicles. This, frankly, is peanuts.’
Unite senior convenor at JLR Castle Bromwich Mick Livingstone said: ‘Rather than Tory MPs, who have no idea what they are talking about sniping from the sidelines, they need to wake up and recognise the shambles they have created and the damage they are doing to the UK auto industry.’