Harland & Wolff

[brokencrossbar1]

Well that's it. Dublin could do f all but the big brothers in the EU would not let it slide. I don't know how Labour are, but the Tories could not give a feck about anything outside certain parts of England.

The ship yard will end up a high end residential/ retail thing with a museum and the cranes will stay. It'd probably create more jobs.

Completely agree. We were down there a few weeks ago at Tradfest Ceili and were saying exactly the same thing. Part of the whole moving into the 21st century ...create retail/office space. Have a Docklands industry centre. Focus on high end tech and start ups. Rebuild it for the modern day and stop living in the past. Europe and US would fund the f**k out of it if it created opportunities for transatlantic business.

[johnnycool]

Well that's it. Dublin could do f all but the big brothers in the EU would not let it slide. I don't know how Labour are, but the Tories could not give a feck about anything outside certain parts of England.

The ship yard will end up a high end residential/ retail thing with a museum and the cranes will stay. It'd probably create more jobs.

Completely agree. We were down there a few weeks ago at Tradfest Ceili and were saying exactly the same thing. Part of the whole moving into the 21st century ...create retail/office space. Have a Docklands industry centre. Focus on high end tech and start ups. Rebuild it for the modern day and stop living in the past. Europe and US would fund the f**k out of it if it created opportunities for transatlantic business.

Heavy industry is a thing of the past for Western European industries.

Pharma and tech is where it's at as the South is showing.

[Milltown Row2]

Well that's it. Dublin could do f all but the big brothers in the EU would not let it slide. I don't know how Labour are, but the Tories could not give a feck about anything outside certain parts of England.

The ship yard will end up a high end residential/ retail thing with a museum and the cranes will stay. It'd probably create more jobs.

Completely agree. We were down there a few weeks ago at Tradfest Ceili and were saying exactly the same thing. Part of the whole moving into the 21st century ...create retail/office space. Have a Docklands industry centre. Focus on high end tech and start ups. Rebuild it for the modern day and stop living in the past. Europe and US would fund the f**k out of it if it created opportunities for transatlantic business.

Heavy industry is a thing of the past for Western European industries.

Pharma and tech is where it's at as the South is showing.

Its the history which is the main grievance for people associated with the yard, but if they are really true to themselves they'll understand that its not viable and the place has been going down the tubes for a long time.

As BC1 has said the retail/residential planning would generate more and as you have said tech companies would be very interested in that area.

I've a 12 year pension plan with the place, had the opportunity at the time to buy shares, but took the money and went on hols! Pension probably worth buttons now. Ones saying that if they sell it off in small parts (which was the talk) that it will diminish the value? Not sure of the ins and outs of it, I do know that peter Robinson had got shares at the time, be interesting to see how things pan out

[gallsman]

There may be new tech or services jobs in the area in due course, but that's no consolation to the boys who've only ever known H&W and won't be retraining to become senior data engineers in Google earning 100k+.

[NAG1]

There may be new tech or services jobs in the area in due course, but that's no consolation to the boys who've only ever known H&W and won't be retraining to become senior data engineers in Google earning 100k+.

Our East Belfast brethern?

[johnnycool]

There may be new tech or services jobs in the area in due course, but that's no consolation to the boys who've only ever known H&W and won't be retraining to become senior data engineers in Google earning 100k+.

Our East Belfast brethern?

Uncle Sammy used to get them a job in the yard or in Shorts.

Now you need an education.

That's fúcked everything up for young working class lads from these areas.

[gallsman]

There may be new tech or services jobs in the area in due course, but that's no consolation to the boys who've only ever known H&W and won't be retraining to become senior data engineers in Google earning 100k+.

Our East Belfast brethern?

Most likely but the rare Fenian in his mid 50s working there ain't going to fare any better like.

[Milltown Row2]

There may be new tech or services jobs in the area in due course, but that's no consolation to the boys who've only ever known H&W and won't be retraining to become senior data engineers in Google earning 100k+.

Our East Belfast brethern?

Most likely but the rare Fenian in his mid 50s working there ain't going to fare any better like.

Wouldn't say there was many fenians retained after 2002 when it nearly closed. There was around 50 core employees at the time of that initial closure, the rest all came back under contracts with different agencies.

There were generational families there, I knew a guy that his two brothers worked there, his dad (his brother also) worked there and yes, both his grandads were still there when he was starting out. Strangely he was Glengormley, not Mersey street

[Eamonnca1]

There may be new tech or services jobs in the area in due course, but that's no consolation to the boys who've only ever known H&W and won't be retraining to become senior data engineers in Google earning 100k+.

If they want to keep working in engineering they'll probably have to move to Dungannon to work in the mini-Ruhr valley that's appeared out there.

[seafoid]

The Brits are careless when it comes to industrial change.  In the 80s when many industrial jobs were lost the Brits put those concerned on disability while the Germans retrained their people and supported new industries. London and the City will always come before the Unionists. Ireland would have more meas on them.

[Twobounces]

Is it over for them or will someone save them again and rinse and repeat?

[Milltown Row2]

Is it over for them or will someone save them again and rinse and repeat?

No they'll get something sorted, think the company has a contract that's viable (MOD) so someone may step in is what I'm hearing

[tbrick18]

Without knowing the in's and out's of H&W, I do think it's not sustainable to keep something running that consistently operating at a loss.
Regardless of history or jobs, ultimately someone pays for that loss so at some point the difficult decision has to be made.

At the same time, I also think it's incredibly risky to just throw the towel in when it comes to manufacturing/engineering industry in favour of tourism or business districts. If Covid showed us anything, it was that in times of emergency if you don't have your own manufacturing capability you could be in difficulty. If, across the Island, we decide to focus entirely on IT/Pharma etc, we are exposing ourselves to risk in the future I feel.
This is where government should be coming in, with incentives for engineering/manufacturing investment alongside the tech/pharma industries.

It's difficult to marry the need for manufacturing to the need for profitability when competing against the likes of China and with no real obvious compelling current need for on-shoring, but I think it's short sighted to not try to build that industry.

[Simon OParlon]

Without knowing the in's and out's of H&W, I do think it's not sustainable to keep something running that consistently operating at a loss.
Regardless of history or jobs, ultimately someone pays for that loss so at some point the difficult decision has to be made.

At the same time, I also think it's incredibly risky to just throw the towel in when it comes to manufacturing/engineering industry in favour of tourism or business districts. If Covid showed us anything, it was that in times of emergency if you don't have your own manufacturing capability you could be in difficulty. If, across the Island, we decide to focus entirely on IT/Pharma etc, we are exposing ourselves to risk in the future I feel.
This is where government should be coming in, with incentives for engineering/manufacturing investment alongside the tech/pharma industries.

It's difficult to marry the need for manufacturing to the need for profitability when competing against the likes of China and with no real obvious compelling current need for on-shoring, but I think it's short sighted to not try to build that industry.

Wasn't there a study done recently that showed Ireland would be completely screwed if 4 or 5 US companies went elsewhere?

[trueblue1234]

Heavy engineering in NI is going through a downturn in certain areas. Screening/ crushing in particular suffering badly with a number of job losses across all the big players.
Construction looks to be getting impacted too. Signs not good and I could see a couple of bad years coming.

Might hasten the calls for a UI, in that it will provide some motivation for those not politically minded.