Jobs under threat at Twinings

Almost 400 jobs could go at Twinings factories in North Shields and Andover following a restructuring of parent company Associated British Foods' (ABF's) tea operations.

ABF, which posted a 4% increase in full year adjusted pre-tax profits to £655M on sales up 12% to £9.3bn today (November 3) said closing the North Shields factory was a "difficult but necessary step which will allow Twinings to remain competitive in our markets worldwide"

A further 129 jobs could go at the Andover factory, where UK tea production will be consolidated over the next two years.

Some of the production from North Shields would shift to a new plant in Poland. However, there would also be investment in high-speed, automated packaging equipment at Andover, said Marcus Cotter-Stone, international supply director: “This is a very difficult but necessary step which will allow Twinings to remain competitive in our markets worldwide.

“Whilst we have had some overseas manufacturing for decades, the majority of our tea is imported and packaged here in the UK prior to being re-exported; and this is not efficient. As two-thirds of our sales are overseas, we need to locate our manufacturing operations in cost effective locations, closer to markets."

Its Chinese factory would also be doubled in size and concentrate on the US and Asia Pacific markets, while the new factory to be built in Poland would specialise in rest-of-world markets.

Twinings produces around 15M tea bags a year from the North Shields site, which employs 263 people.

Jayne Shotton, from the USDAW trade union said that staff at North Shields site were "shocked and upset" by the news. She added: "It came as a complete surprise. The site here is productive so it feels like a kick in the teeth." The union was in talks with the company and planned to present some alternatives to closure in the coming weeks, she said.