Reeves: 'I just hope there's something left to salvage at Hitachi'
| Published date | 12 April 2024 |
| Publication title | Evening Chronicle |
And Rachel Reeves has now warned that the Japanese manufacturing giant could begin a redundancy consultation in just a couple of months' time if the Government fails to act before then to protect the site's future.
Labour and union leaders have been urging Tory ministers to trigger an extension to the company's contract to build trains for the West Coast line in order to protect its 750-strong workforce.
Work on Hitachi's existing contracts is expected to decline by this October, with the company warning it faces a production gap with no new deals in place in the shortterm and has been "reviewing all remaining options".
Ms Reeves, who visited the Hitachi plant on Wednesday and met with bosses, told The Chronicle that a Labour government would seek to "salvage the wreckage" if the party comes to power later this year.
Speaking on a visit to Cramlington yesterday morning, the Shadow Chancellor said: "The frustrating thing is that we are not the decision-makers today and there are decisions being made now that, if we were in government, would not be the decisions we were making.
"So the thing we are doing right now is putting pressure on the Government to bring forward new procurement, exercise the option to build the additional trains for the West Coast Line, and give greater certainty about the HS2 timetable.
"The sooner the election is, the easier it will be to undo the damage that the Tories are causing at the moment. The longer it is, the harder it will be to reverse it.
"The business said yesterday that the consultation on redundancies will start in June.
"I don't know if there will be an election before June, I really hope there is, but the likelihood is that there won't be. The contract that they have runs until October but after that they have no work until HS2. I want to come in and salvage the wreckage. I just hope there is something left to salvage by the time the Government calls a general election."
Asked if a future Labour administration would realistically be able to return jobs to the plant if redundancies went ahead before an election is held, Ms Reeves added: "I really hope so. Part of the reason to go yesterday was to tell the management team, and I also want...
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