Around 270 jobs at the Royal Ordnance factory in Bishopton,
Scotland, will be lost following BAE Systems’ decision to switch its propellant
production to Germany.
Management has started negotiating employees’ redundancy
packages with the T&G union.
A spokeswoman for BAE Systems’ Royal Ordnance said, "We
will cease production at the Bishopton site in mid-2002 once all our orders are
complete. It’s a very sensitive time at the moment. No redundancy programme has been worked out yet," said a BAE
Systems Royal Ordnance spokeswoman.
T&G officials met with the Scottish Executive yesterday
to press for a National Audit Office inquiry into the costs of closing
Bishopton.
"We believe it will conduct a thorough inquiry into the
mounting costs of closing Bishopton, which are already running at £100,000 per
head for each Scottish job lost. We
hope ministers and BAE Systems managers will then see sense and reprieve the
factory from closure," said Jack Dromey, national organisers for the
T&G union.
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By Karen Higginbottom
