4800 jobs go

I used to live in Swindon, Honda are a huge employer and part of the community, but they draw in people from a big area. Locally we also have BMW (Mini) in Swindon and Oxford. There arent many other manufacturing jobs locally.
It would have been an ideal slight for Tesla to move into.
The local community have known about this for a few years, and leading up to it there has been a lot of rumour and speculation every few years.
The relative high rates of pay are both a good short term thing for the employees, but also make them uncompetitive in a global employment. Honda do not sell enough cars into Europe for them to continue in Swindon. Something to think about when we all seem to chase buying German cars.
 
Boro in Devon said:
I used to live in Swindon, Honda are a huge employer and part of the community, but they draw in people from a big area. Locally we also have BMW (Mini) in Swindon and Oxford. There arent many other manufacturing jobs locally.
It would have been an ideal slight for Tesla to move into.
The local community have known about this for a few years, and leading up to it there has been a lot of rumour and speculation every few years.
The relative high rates of pay are both a good short term thing for the employees, but also make them uncompetitive in a global employment. Honda do not sell enough cars into Europe for them to continue in Swindon. Something to think about when we all seem to chase buying German cars.
Click to expand...
Honda do sell enough cars into Europe. The problem is it’s no longer cost effective for them to make cars in the UK and sell them in Europe for some, unknown, reason.
Good shout about employees moving to Teesside. If they can stay in jobs in a similar industry that’s a good thing. It sucks for Swindon but the main thing is jobs staying in the UK and UK employees still being able to work
 
FatCat said:
This could be promising

news.sky.com

Amazon-backed electric vehicle maker Rivian in talks with ministers over UK factory

Rivian, which counts Amazon and Ford among its shareholders, is talking to the government about building a car production facility - its first outside the US - on a site near Bristol, Sky News learns.
news.sky.com news.sky.com
Click to expand...
That’s a good sign. I presume that could cover the whole European market too. Rivian won’t sell the volumes over here as they do in North America.

This is very good news though if it comes off. Think rivian could be a big name either their ex Tesla staff
 
SmallTown said:
That’s a good sign. I presume that could cover the whole European market too. Rivian won’t sell the volumes over here as they do in North America.

This is very good news though if it comes off. Think rivian could be a big name either their ex Tesla staff
Click to expand...
Love that Rivian pick-up truck.
 
Honda are moving the brunt of their workforce back to Japan aren't they? Least that's what I what I read a couple years back.

They've always been successful in Japan and America, not so much in Europe when you can get similar cars for a lower price. For example the civic type R is on average a £1000 more expensive than a golf GTi, that's a lot of money for 70bhp more and a quicker 0-60 time by 0.4 seconds.
 
It is sad to see a large manufacturing going that pays its work force staff well £20/hour is £740/week or £37,000 a year.

Every worker expected to find work as they are plenty of job vacancies in the Swindon area, but as said workers will have to make a significant wage cut. I remember Dyson moving most of its production from its Wiltshire factories to Malaysia, because it said it struggled to find enough workers in Wiltshire and the local residents did not want the Wiltshire factories to expand. I would guess production cost being lower in Malaysia also was a big factor.

Honda say its cheaper to produce all their electric vehicles at one large plant in Japan and the same in the USA, and pay the tariffs into the European Market, than make electric vehicles at a third plant in Swindon. See BBC article.

ttps://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-wiltshire-57987601

The EU/EEC used to have a quota on Japanese made cars, maybe that no longer exists?
 
Redwurzel said:
Honda say its cheaper to produce all
The EU/EEC used to have a quota on Japanese made cars, maybe that no longer exists?
Click to expand...
The EU-Japan trade deal, which comes into effect today (Friday, February 1), immediately sees the current 10% tariff on Japanese cars imported into the EU to 9.2%. EU import tariffs on cars manufactured in Japan will continue to fall year-on-year and by 2032 will be zero.

eu japan trade deal
 
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