Ford Has a Fight on its Hands!

Workers' Daily Internet Edition: Article Index :

Plan to Close Coventry’s Browns Lane Jaguar Plant:
Ford Has a Fight on its Hands!

Commentary from Birmingham Branch of RCPB(ML):
Workers Endeavour to Save the Day at Jaguar

Report of Amicus and T&G, 20 Sep 2004:
Angry Jaguar Workers Will Fight Ford UK Cuts

Listen to a Ford spokesman: "We do understand the strength of feeling generated by our announcement regarding Browns Lane. However, as we explained last week our business situation is unsustainable and we have been left with no alternative but to undertake the package of actions we announced at that time."

Who says there is no alternative? Who says the business situation is unsustainable? Have the workers said so?

No! The workers are angry that their livelihoods are to be decimated without so much as a by-your-leave, they are angry that their community will be devastated were the Browns Lane plant to close, they are angry about the damage to the national economy already carried out by Ford and about to be escalated. They have not decided that there is no alternative and that the business situation is unsustainable.

In fact, all the guarantees given by Ford over the years about the future of car production in Britain have proved worthless, including the one on the security of the West Midlands plants until 2008.

This is why Ford now has a fight on its hands. Don’t believe it when the media say the workers are resigned to their fate! The workers are above all angry that the Ford capitalists have no honour, that they are anti-worker and have no concern for the future of Coventry or the national economy.

The workers have kept their side of the bargain and have made Browns Lane into one of Europe’s top performing car plants. Now it appears that the bargain is off. Ford’s decision is not a survival plan to make the business sustainable. Closing Jaguar and revamping working practices at Land Rover is no solution to anything but how the Ford board, its bankers and institutional shareholders can step up the robbery of the workers and wreck the economy.

Tony Blair the other week told the TUC that the class war is over and now the name of the game is social partnership. But this does not wash amongst the workers.

They Jaguar workers will never be reconciled to their fate being decided in Detroit. They know that the financiers say that Ford as a whole is surging ahead. The workers must decide the fate of their own social product, and put national and international trade under their direction in order to save the day and lead society out of the crisis.

Commentary from Birmingham Branch of RCPB(ML)

Once more the car workers are faced with a struggle to ensure both their future and the future of the nation’s economy, which includes manufacturing at the base. As has happened on numerous occasions, the fluctuations of the market and in particular the overproduction crisis, downsizing and closure are on the agenda.

Generations of Jaguar workers have gone through many ups and downs. From the outset when the capitalist entrepreneur, Lyons set up the Jaguar factory in Coventry, through the years of ownership by British Leyland, again to the privatisation and then the buying of Jaguar by the notoriously ruthless Ford Motor Company, the workers have fought and struggled for survival in a precarious market.

The future of the Jaguar marque is uncertain, as is the future of the workers along with it. There are many, as of yet, unanswered questions. Will the company be consolidated and downsized at Halewood or Castle Bromwich? Or will it go to America? Will it continue to exist? What will happen to the workforce, will they work again? What will happen to the Pension Fund? Indeed what will Ford do with the rest of the Ford owned companies like Land Rover and the Ford companies throughout Europe?

These and many questions like them are supposedly in the hands of those in the boardroom that are to make the decisions. In the complex equation, which takes into consideration the opinions of the owners, the government, the market, globalisation and various other factors, the input of the workers and their marginalisation is an imperative for deliberation. So the question is once more posed for the workers: who decides?

For Coventry, the Browns Lane site has been termed the "spiritual home" of Jaguar; of course this is where it originated. It is the flagship of the manufacturing city. Since the Nazis blitzed Coventry during the Second World War, the eighties saw devastation under the closure of industry programme when Thatcher was in power. Since though, we have seen the rundown and closure of other sites including Roll Royce and Massey Ferguson. So today, when we see manufacturing falling down to less than 13% of GDP the issue of export of capital and its legality comes heavily into question.

The workers, their shop stewards and their unions have condemned the plans of the Ford Motor Company. Like many of the Ford workers they want to oppose the company plans, they have a feeling of solidarity and wish to remain united so that the full weight of their consciousness can deliver united mass action to restrict the "monopoly right" of Ford to have its way to ensure and maximise profit by making the workers pay for the crisis in the company. Instead they want to raise the rights of the workers who not only are fighting for their own livelihoods and security but the future of all workers.

The workers have created so much through their labour over the years and the company are intent on stealing the whole of the product that has been created by generations and eventually move it to America. The movement of capital from Browns Lane to Castle Bromwich is seen as a sop and the workers refuse to be divided over it or sold it.

In the struggle to defend their livelihoods and their vital interests the workers come up against the interests of the monopolies like Ford. Working people build solidarity by holding to its maxim that An Injury To One Is An Injury To All! This has always been the battle cry from the workers in action when it calls for solidarity from all in rallying to the cause. The cause here is indeed a vital and just one and has to be responded to for the sake of everyone.

The union makes us strong!
An injury to one is an injury to all!
Unity is strength!
Save the day at Jaguar!

Report of Amicus and T&G, 20 Sep 2004

In a series of union meetings today workers at Jaguar have expressed their opposition to Ford's decision to end production at Browns Lane in Coventry and make 1,150 job cuts across the company. Members have voted overwhelmingly to oppose closure and backed a call for an industrial action ballot.

T&G and Amicus shop stewards and members at Browns Lane have voted overwhelmingly (86%) to oppose the cuts. Members at Castle Bromwich and at the research and development centre at Whitley have voted to support them in whatever action they take.  

Workers are furious that Ford have reneged on a previous agreement to keep Jaguar production at Brown Lane. The workforce has also been angered by Ford's making the announcement via the media on the plant's downturn day.

Today's meetings at the Browns Lane, Castle Bromwich and Halewood Jaguar plants will be followed by 'sounding' meetings across the rest of Ford UK this week including Land Rover, Aston Martin and Ford Blue Oval facilities and the company's research sites at Dunton, Gaydon and Coventry.

Amicus General Secretary, Derek Simpson, said: "The effective closure of Browns Lane goes against the promises made by Ford for the site to remain the centre for Jaguar production in the UK. We also believe that the 750 staff side cuts being proposed across the company means the closure of the research and development facility at Whitley and will ultimately jeopardise Jaguar's survival in the UK. That is why we will support and lead our members in whatever action they feel will be most effective in opposing the cuts."

Tony Woodley, General Secretary of the T&G, said: "Jaguar workers are angry and feel betrayed by the company they have delivered so much for. Jaguar has undermined the trust of its workforce by breaking an agreement on the security of the West Midlands plants. Members are solid in their opposition to closure and they are being backed all the way by the unions' leadership."

Under the plan only 310 jobs will remain at Browns Lane making wood finishes for Jaguar models. 750 staff side jobs will be lost at Browns Lane and the rest of the company.