Protest escalates over wind turbine factory closure
By Liz Stephens
Several hundred protesters are expected outside the Vestas wind turbine plant on the Isle of Wight tonight, with more demonstrations planned outside the Department of Energy and Climate Change.
Twenty-five workers are currently staging a sit-in protest in an attempt to save Britain’s only major wind turbine manufacturing plant from closure next Friday.
In April, the company announced plans to shut the business and move manufacturing to America with the potential loss of 600 jobs.
This will mean that the 7,000 turbines the government has committed to over the next ten years, will be manufactured overseas.
The protests come just a week after energy and climate change secretary, Ed Miliband, announced thousands of new jobs would be created by a low-carbon economy.
Miliband said he had been trying hard to help avoid job losses: “There must be a strategy for the Isle of Wight to do all we can to help and there is. Not just support for the workers who are losing their jobs, but a strategy to work with Vestas”.
Tonight’s protest will contain the unusual pairing of trade unionists and environmental campaigners – who normally have a difficult relationship, with one supporting industry and the other attacking the pollution it causes.
Greenpeace UK executive director John Sauven said: “Historically there has been animosity between the two sides. If we can build this new alliance and break down those perceived barriers then there all sorts of exciting opportunities”.
Last night, the RMT union confirmed it would provide legal assistance to the workers involved in the sit-in.
The union has also written to Mr Miliband and Vestas company chiefs, urging them to hold emergency talks aimed at saving the factory.
Bob Crow, general secretary of the RMT Union, said: “This dispute brings together two crucial issues – the right to protection from companies who abuse the law to hire and fire and the right to live in a world where the environment and sustainability are absolute priorities.”
“The government stand accused of sheer hypocrisy over their public announcements on climate change while our only wind turbine factory faces the axe.
“If the government can nationalise the banks at the drop of a hat there is no reason whatsoever why they can’t nationalise Vestas.”
Jack Dromey, deputy general-secretary of Unite, said: “It would be a bitter irony if there was a boom in British wind farms but the wind turbines were made on the Continent and in China.”
A spokesman for the Department of Energy and Climate Change said: “Ultimately it was a commercial decision for Vestas. But the Renewable Energy Strategy is going to be a massive opportunity for manufacturers generally.”
Vestas blames market pressures for the closure of the plant. The company said it manufactured on-shore wind turbines for the US market, which are currently unsuitable for the UK.
