Coventry faces Peugeot axe
WORKERS, MAY 2006 ISSUE
Coventry has been one of Britain's foremost engineering and manufacturing based cities. In the early 1980s one in eight of the workers in the city had an engineering qualification and most people were involved with making things.
Yet despite their immense industrial skills, the people of Coventry have proved alarmingly unskilful in defending industry. Yes, there were the heady days of the Triumph Co-operative and Lucas Aerospace plans, and the poignant work of the trades council to argue along with other industrial centres for state intervention in industry. But one by one the factories closed. Once defiant Communist factory branches and joint shop stewards committees were purposefully destroyed. Rolls Royce was the last to go; now its Parkside site is the home base for the Lego-lookalike Learning and Skills Council, which is laying its workers off as Britain abandons a further generation of industrial workers.
One million industrial jobs have gone since Labour was elected. The leading industrial companies in Europe, whether Peugeot or BMW, have penetrated the British market in order to help run it down. The weaker Britain becomes, the better for them. Look at Birmingham and Rover and look at Coventry and Peugeot. Infiltrate and destroy has been the watchword of the European Union since its inception.
Peugeot dealership in Coventry: soon all the cars will be imported. Photo: Workers
Unions that have supported the EU in a craven manner, especially Amicus, now complain that it is easier to sack workers here than in Europe. Their point is that if we were all in Europe we would be better off. The reality is that unemployment in the eurozone is double ours and all the so-called "social partnership" or pro labour laws in Europe have not stopped EU capital from weakening economies under their control.
Workers at Peugeot in Coventry knew three years ago that the new plant in Slovakia would produce many more up to date cars at a third of the wages and at the very least would threaten assembly work here. And when the Department of Trade and Industry took four years to process Peugeot's request for development grants and assistance and then turned it down, blaming the EU, the writing was on the wall: the closure of Peugeot Ryton with the loss of nearly 2,500 jobs. The Ryton workers ignored the warnings and let things go, agreeing to work harder for less and then accept redundancies. Draconian work conditions – such as 2.30 am finishes and shorter breaks – agreed by the unions enabled Peugeot to pro-duce the last 206s and bring forward the closure date. Meanwhile under the ever tightening grip of the European Union, capital flowed east, labour flowed east and all of us suffered.
But so astounded did the union leaders claim to be when the eventual announcements to close came, that they pledged total commitment to "strike action". Strike action in this situation is like the condemned prisoner calling for poison instead of a last meal. What workers should be doing is taking over the plant for alternative production for Britain.
Coventry's whole architecture and town planning has been built around the illusion of surviving without making things. Industrialists will find it harder to reinvest in the city than sweet shop owners. Spivs raised their hats when the redundancies were announced because the thriving economy in gambling, retail and recreation demands all the locally based labour it can get, the cheaper the better. You won't even need to import Eastern European labour. Just sack a workforce and watch them compete for low paid jobs.
Following years of EU fanaticism in Amicus, and Labour Party cronyism in both the T&G and Amicus, the stage is set for a last resounding defeat. Workers have lost faith in their unions, which have failed to organise in manufacturing, and will choose hairdressing and curtain making as valuable alternatives to fighting for a boss who has absconded. The battle is on once again in Coventry, as it has been for 25 years, to see in this dilemma either a vibrant socialist future or another retreat by British workers.