Manufacturing Wales, the independent voice of manufacturing in Wales, has pledged its support to help provide valuable high-skill opportunities for those employees being made redundant from the Aston Martin production plant in St. Athan.

News emerged last week that the luxury car manufacturer is making redundant 95 full-time permanent employees, as well as laying off a further 100 agency workers, as part of a cost-reduction programme.

“We’re here to help: matching employees’ skills with the many different career opportunities in our member companies”

“We’re here to help if we can in situations like this”, says Frank Holmes, Chair of Manufacturing Wales. “Our members include some of the most advanced manufacturers in Wales, each offering strong and stable employment opportunities for many different skillsets – and welcome any direct contact from employees who are being made redundant, matching their skills and ambitions with the wide variety of quality career opportunities on offer right now in the manufacturing companies who make up our membership. Taking practical win-win actions like this is part of what ‘building back better’ and creating ‘better jobs closer to home’ is all about.”

“As responsible businesses, we owe it to everyone involved to try and offer quality and stable jobs elsewhere in our manufacturing ecosystem.”

 Andrew Evans, Board Member of Manufacturing Wales and Senior Director of Newport-based SPTS Technologies (a KLA company), welcomes the opportunity to help: “This is another example of how the manufacturing community here in Wales can support each other – not just with knowledge share, supply chain efficiencies and maximising joint commercial opportunities, but by working together to safeguard and retain valuable talent in the region and in Wales.”

“World leading manufacturers and brands choose Wales because of our hardworking, dedicated and skilled talent. It’s a shared responsibility of the manufacturing community to try and safeguard as much of this valuable resource, as many of the sought after skills are transferable across the manufacturing industries. For example, we have an opening for test engineers in our Newport factory that’s likely to be suitable for test engineers working in the automotive industry who may be affected by redundancies. As responsible businesses, we owe it to everyone involved to try and offer quality and stable jobs elsewhere in our manufacturing ecosystem.”

“Doing all we can to collaborate – including sharing our training processes.”

For Alison Orrells, CEO of the Safety Letterbox Company, “keeping this talent in Wales is crucial for our economic resilience, our GVA and for growing a critical mass of expertise – our skillsbase gives us the edge in so many vital markets” while fellow-Manufacturing Wales Board Member Oliver Conger, MD of Port Talbot-based Rototherm, stressed “We’re doing all we can at Manufacturing Wales to engender this spirit of collaboration and cooperation – including our newly-launched initiative where we share our training processes, so that all current employees or new recruits in any Manufacturing Wales company can learn best practices in the most efficient and cost-effective way possible. This is yet another feature that we’re adding to our Member Benefits – and it really will benefit all.”

To find out more about the benefits of joining Manufacturing Wales – or to explore what roles are available with member organisations – go to:  www.manufacturingwales.com