Hundreds of jobs under threat as Rolls- Royce eyes Singapore move
ROLLS- ROYCE HAS confirmed plans to shut an aerospace factory in Nottinghamshire and is looking to merge sites in Lancashire as part of a shake- up in the face of the pandemic.
The engine maker said it plans toclose itssiteinAnnesley, bythe end of 2022, in a move impacting around 120 staff, although the group is hoping most will transfer to its base in Derby.
But around 350 jobs are under threat as it revealed plans to stop making wide chord fan blades for new engines at its Bankfield site in Barnoldswick, Lancashire, by autumn 2023.
It will shift the work to its Singapore site.
It is also considering merging its Ghyll Brow base with the nearby Bankfield site as part of a group- wide restructure to save £ 1.3 billion in response to the coronavirus crisis.
The cuts are part of the mammoth 9,000 global job losses it announced in May to adapt to plunging demand after the aviation industry was hit hard by the pandemic.
Rolls said it was in talks with trade unions over the proposals and would “do everything we can” to avoid compulsory redundancies. Trade union Unite criticised the moves as a “horrible blow for staff”.
Unite national officer for aerospace Rhys McCarthy added: “For Rolls- Royce to lay out plans to lay off the majority of staff at its Barnoldswick sites whilst moving work to Singapore is a complete betrayal of a skilled and loyal workforce.
“In 2009, staff were assured that the production of Trent engine wide chord blades would continue at Barnoldswick despite another plant being opened in Singapore – an assurance we now know was not worth the paper it was written on.”
But Rolls- Royce said some work assembling Trent engines in Singapore will also move to the UK as it reviews its global operations.
Rolls said: “The Covid- 19 pandemic has created a historic shock in civil aviation which will take several years to recover.
“Demand for our civil aerospace products and services has fallen significantly and we’ve had to take difficult but necessary decisions to position ourselves for the future.
“Today we have told our employees that we are proposing to close some of our sites, and some will see significant reductions in workload.”
OthersitesacrossRolls- Royce’s global operations are also affected by the cuts.
The group confirmed that a site in Virginia, America, is set to close.
In July it was announced more than 3,000 workers had expressed interest in voluntary redundancy at Rolls- Royce across its UK operations.
The engine company announced plans in May to reduce 9,000 jobs across its global workforce.
About 1,500 jobs were expected to be lost from the manufacturer’s Derby headquarters this year.
About 52,000 people work for the engine- maker globally, and the company employs about 9,000 people at its Derby headquarters.
In a trading update, the firm said so- called engine flying hours had fallen by 75 per cent in the second quarter of the year.
The firm said it expected that it would take the aviation industry “several years to recover”.
Plans to lay off the majority of staff ( are) a complete betrayal. Rhys McCarthy, Unite national officer for aerospace.