A betrayal of trust

Stopping production of Jaguars at the Browns Lane factory in Coventry would not only mark the end of a historical episode. It would also rip the heart out of the local economy.

It is not simply the loss of jobs at Jaguar itself but also the knock-on effects on suppliers and other companies that rely on cash from the car giant and its workers.

Ford has cynically broken the undertaking that it freely gave to maintain Jaguar production at the site and the scale of its staff cuts also indicates that it intends to drop essential research and development at nearby Whitley.

Once again, a transnational corporation employer has treated workers in this country with contempt, both in its choice of where to cut back production and of how to announce it.

Jaguar's trade unions were not consulted and the first that most workers knew of the plan to throw them on the scrap heap was hearing it or reading it in the media.

As usual, the bosses have availed themselves of the industrial relations legislation favoured by the Tories and new Labour that denies workers and their unions any meaningful right to consultation over the company's plans.

Ford and new Labour ministers regard workers as numbers on a balance sheet to be disposed of at a stroke of the pen.

The government's "business-friendly" approach is a dagger to the heart of all British workers employed by transnational corporations, since it makes British jobs easier to dispose of and, so, more vulnerable.

Since legislation cannot prevent jobs being sacrificed, more traditional methods of resistance have to be considered.

This country's manufacturing sector is getting the salami treatment, with workplaces and jobs being sliced away month after month.

Britain's continued deindustrialisation should be of concern to all working people, since it undermines the wealth-creation potential to pay for health, education and welfare services.

Replacing better-paid skilled jobs in our shrinking manufacturing sector with a variety of short-term or casual McJobs does not provide the economic basis for a modern society.

It also masks the true level of joblessness, which will become more evident as the erosion of manufacturing hastens and becomes irreversible.

Our real unemployment figures are disguised by the transfer of many middle-aged jobless people onto other allowances, especially disability benefit.

The determination of the Jaguar workers to defend their jobs, their communities and their industry - if needs be, by industrial action - could be a clarion call to all workers across Britain.

Workers are not simply ciphers in the board games of big business, to be shuffled about as part of the charade of so-called globalisation.

They have rights and the ability to ensure that companies and governments respect those rights.