Eerie atmosphere at former Michelin site

Politicians might have high hopes for the future of the former Michelin factory site around two miles from the centre of Ballymena where the last of its 840 workers finished up just a few months ago.

But amid stringent efforts to create new jobs and give it a new lease of life, there’s something eerie about the sprawling complex when viewed up close.

Heras fencing blocks what was once the main entrance to the Michelin staff car park – and yet the electronic barrier in front of it is still working and if you get too close it still raises automatically on a road to nowhere.

The former car park itself, already crumbling, features half-tyres sticking out of the ground where once there were parking spaces.

And in the background, two giant wind turbines – not dissimilar to those found at Michelin in Dundee – still turn against the autumnal sun.

Round the corner, the once buoyant Michelin Athletic Club looks derelict with its football pitch and rusting goalposts sad and abandoned.

And while no Michelin signage remains, peeling blue paint on the front gates is reminiscent of the colour scheme found at the entrance to the plant in Dundee.

The Courier met former Michelin employee and Ballymena man Peter Parkhill, 54, who worked for eight years as a tyre maker and latterly drove a forklift truck. He was made redundant on the last day of June this year – 31 months after the closure announcement – and still gets emotional when he reflects on how the factory that existed for most of his life came to an end.

“There had been rumours going around for a while, but when a workforce of more than 800 people are taken in one morning and told that it’s closing, it was a bit of a shock,” he said, gazing across the abandoned site.

“To be honest 2½ years was probably too long for people to be waiting for the closure to happen. People were on edge, knew they were losing their jobs, were unsure of the future and were scared to take the step out into the unknown when they had been earning £500 or £600 per week.”

Peter is a grandfather with grown up children. However, unemployment has still had an impact on him and he said it’s particularly difficult finding work at his age.

With the loss of around 2,200 heavy industry jobs in Ballymena since 2016, he claimed that in spite of political rhetoric, people locally are “disengaging” with politicians.

The absence of a government at Stormont meant there was “no leadership” while uncertainties over Brexit, which many workers supported, were also having an impact, he said.

Peter claimed Michelin top management knew Ballymena was closing up to a year before staff were told, and he wouldn’t be surprised if a similar situation existed in Dundee.

And yet around 20 people made redundant in Ballymena were allowed to relocate to Dundee, he said, and were now left “high and dry”.

“A senior manager at Ballymena who I can’t name said he fought for a full year to save the Ballymena plant before they had to announce the closure,” he said. “I’d imagine Dundee would be similar. There’s a feeling amongst all the workforce that it’s Michelin’s plan to pull out of the UK.”

Peter said Ballymena was becoming a “ghost town” as a result of this and other recent closures and when people’s redundancy money ran out he feared it would become worse.

There was also a knock-on economic effect with 200 subcontractors formerly dependent on the Michelin site also hit.

The town had a major drug problem over 20 years ago, he said, and “that’s surfacing again” due to disillusionment and lack of opportunities.

Life chances for local youngsters were now “limited”, he said, and it was no longer a case of young people having to leave town for Belfast to find work – he claimed many were having to leave Northern Ireland altogether, echoing patterns elsewhere in the UK where former industrial towns had lost their purpose. Rightly or wrongly, many former Michelin workers in Ballymena voted for Brexit, he said, because they believed immigrants from the EU reduced their chances of work.

“Ballymena has gradually declined from what was the biggest market town in Northern Ireland with over 30 engineering and manufacturing processing plants to there being none left,” he said.

“Whether we like to say it or not, immigration is also an issue. If people travel from foreign shores to work here, it limits what local people can do.

“When there’s a vacuum and people are struggling to survive – to feed their families – anything can happen.”