The Workers Party of Britain condemns plans to close the Dickies Workwear site in Midsomer Norton, Somerset, making 280 workers redundant.
Originally trading as Clares, the business was founded in 1900 in Somerset to supply the agriculture sector with workwear. In the 1980s it was bought out by a Texan company, before being snaffled up by the giant VF Corporation in 2017.
Now VF, which counts among its other scalps prestigious brands like Timberland and North Face, proposes by a stroke of the pen to call time on over a century of workwear manufacture in Somerset, consigning its workforce to the scrap heap by the end of March next year.
So what’s the problem? Is there suddenly no longer any need for hi-vis jackets and steel-capped boots in Britain? Do we no longer need to produce protective work clothes? Clearly this cannot be the case. So why commit this act of vandalism?
VF simply announces its current business model is “not in line” with finance performance expectations. In plain English, this means that by axing Dickies in Midsomer Norton, VF calculates that it can further boost its profits – at the expense of the livelihoods of 280 workers and the capacity of British industry.
Workers at Dickies will do well to challenge the sacrifice of their jobs on the altar of VF’s greed, and to resist this senseless closure by any means necessary.