Fighter firm shot down
Anger as raider wins GKN battle
THE Government faced fury after a “corporate raider” won backing to buy one of Britain’s oldest engineering firms.
Shareholders in GKN, a major supplier of car and plane parts and technology for fighter jets, yesterday voted 52.43% in favour of Melrose’s £8billion offer.
GKN dates back 259 years, made Spitfires in the Second World War and employs 58,000 people worldwide, including 6,000 here. The fight for the firm was the most hostile for a decade.
Melrose specialises in buying ailing businesses, making big changes and selling them on for a profit within five years.
Melrose chairman Christopher Miller said: “We are delighted and grateful.”
But Jack Dromey, MP for Birmingham Erdington, called it “a bleak day for British industry”, adding that Britain’s takeover rules were in “desperate need of reform”.
Shadow Business Secretary Rebecca LongBailey said ministers “could have intervened to stop this takeover and did not”. She added: “They have allowed a takeover to happen which may harm both our national security and industrial strategy.”
Steve Turner, assistant general secretary for aerospace at the union Unite, said it would be “holding Melrose’s feet to the fire over concessions it has made, and seeking guarantees on job security, investment and future work in the UK”.
Business Secretary Greg Clark said: “Melrose made commitments which they are bound to honour including investment in research and development and maintaining itself as a UK business.”
The deal still needs to be considered by the Ministry of Defence on the grounds of national security. Defence Secretary Gavin Williamson has expressed concern. Meanwhile, the Committee on Foreign Investment in the US has also yet to approve it.