Call to ‘get tough’ following CS Wind redundancies
CS Wind UK must not remove any equipment and must repay money if it withdraws from Machrihanish, the MSP for Argyll and Bute and Unite the Union have said.
Michael Russell MSP and Charlie McDonald, regional officer for the union, have put their names to a joint letter telling Highlands and Islands Enterprise (HIE) to get tough with the company which has laid off much of its Kintyre workforce.
‘We are concerned the equipment in the plant may be removed by the company and shipped to other countries, where the company has other factories,’ they said.
This could block any other rescue options, they added, and called for HIE to intervene directly ‘to remind the company of its lease’.
They wrote: ‘The company should be made aware of any obligations it would have to repay grants or loads were it to withdraw from Machrihanish.’
CS Wind is not talking to either the press or making its plans clear.
‘We are concerned at the lack of clarity from the company about its plans,’ Mr Russell and Mr McDonald wrote last week.
This follows a meeting they had with CS Wind shop stewards and Paul Wheelhouse, Scottish Energy Minister.
The minister has undertaken to contact the company to tell it that no additional monies can be made available in the way they appear to be expecting or demanding, and he has urged CS Wind to indicate what its intentions are.
As things now stand, Mr Russell and Mr McDonald ask HIE to start ‘intensive work’ on considering alternatives to CS Wind for Machrihanish.
‘We firmly believe that there must be a place for a Scottish-based manufacturing company serving the wind industry in Scotland and given the history of the factory at Machrihanish and the skills of the workforce, we further believe such a company has to be based upon the existing facility,’ say Michael Russell MSP and Unite the Union.