Shorts halve planned Christmas redundancies

The Belfast-based aerospace company Shorts has said half of the redundancies planned to take effect this December will not now go ahead.

After the terrorist attacks of September 11 2001 the firm, which is owned by the Canadian aerospace company Bombardier, said they envisaged cutting around 2000 jobs as a result of the global economic downturn in the air travel industry.

This September the firm announced, that as part of the cutbacks, 350 people would lose their jobs. That was on top of an announcement earlier this year that 460 people would lose their jobs.

However Shorts said on Friday that after talks with union leaders, of the 700 people who were to lose their jobs in December, 342 would in fact be paid off.

"The company with the support of the trade unions, the company has made significant progress in mitigating the manpower surplus of 700 announced in September 2002," Bombardier said.

"The reduction in potential redundancies is mainly due to a successful repatriation of some work packages, voluntary packages, retraining and redeployment, and upward changes in our customers' requirements," they added.

The company said all those who would lose their jobs would be paid off on 6 December.

Bombardier added: "At this stage, we do not envisage another tranche in January 2003, but this is assuming that our customers' requirements are maintained.

"They have been constantly fluctuating due to changing market conditions. Manpower levels will, therefore, continue to be kept under close review. The reduction still enables us to retain a strong integrated design and manufacturing capabilities.

"While we very much regret losing highly valued employees, it is essential that the company remains competitive and ready for the upturn when it comes."

(AMcE)