Jobs Concern At Wrexham’s JCB Plant

JCB have confirmed their transmissions section in Wrexham, where the company has two plants producing axles and gear boxes, is affected by a jobs announcement today.

JCB has today started consultations with shop floor employees over proposed redundancies as a ‘rapid deterioration in world construction equipment markets continues’. The slowdown, which started in the summer, has resulted in a big fall in machine orders from customers according to JCB.

As a result, up to 290 shop floor positions are now at risk of redundancy in the UK. Discussions over the proposed redundancies have begun today with the GMB union and a 45 day consultation period has started.

JCB CEO Graeme Macdonald said: “Manufacturers in the construction equipment industry are currently facing very tough trading conditions and we have to react to the current market reality to protect the long-term future of the business. Regrettably this means taking the very difficult decision to reduce the number of shop floor positions by up to 290 across the UK. As the global economy shows no sign of improving, the short-term outlook remains very challenging.”

JCB GMB Works Convenor Gordon Richardson said: “This news is obviously very disappointing but it has been apparent now for some time that global markets have been declining. Our job as a trade union is to now work hard to formulate a plan to mitigate the impact of the proposed redundancies.”

The news follows an announcement in September that up to 400 UK staff positions were at risk of redundancy as a result of the economic situation. Consultations over those redundancies continue.

In the first six months of the year, the market in Russia has dropped by 70%, Brazil by 36% and China by 47%. Parts of Europe are also struggling, with France down by 26%. Even the strong growth in the UK and North America has softened due to a fall in market confidence over the summer, which has been prompted to an extent by low oil and commodity prices in countries which depend on these resources to drive economic growth.