The Government is to seek repayment of about £17m of state aid provided to the

The Government is to seek repayment of about £17m of state aid provided to the mobile phone giant Motorola after the company delivered Scotland’s biggest jobs blow in 15 years by closing its plant at Bathgate, West Lothian, with the loss of 3,200 jobs. The company said it had taken the decision because of a global decline in mobile phone sales. The Government is to seek repayment of about £17m of state aid provided to the mobile phone giant Motorola after the company delivered Scotland’s biggest jobs blow in 15 years by closing its plant at Bathgate, West Lothian, with the loss of 3,200 jobs. The company said it had taken the decision because of a global decline in mobile phone sales.
A total of £34m was paid to the company in state aid up to and after 1991, when it began operations at Bathgate and built the workforce up to about 3,000. Since 1995 about £17m has been paid out in three tranches linked to smaller scale expansions and this is the money which the Government will seek to claw back.The Foreign Secretary, Robin Cook, whose Livingston constituency is close to the Bathgate plant, accused Motorola of creating a “human tragedy” and said he was “bitterly disappointed” that the company did not listen to the case for keeping the factory open. Downing Street said that while the decision was a commercial one, it was a “bitter blow” to the local community and stressed that it was “perfectly understandable” that Mr Cook had been so scathing in his criticism.Tony Blair’s spokesman revealed that the Prime Minister made a 15-minute personal call to the Motorola president, Chris Galvin, two weeks ago in an attempt to save the plant, and this was followed up by offers of help from Mr Cook, Stephen Byers, the Secretary of State for Trade and Industry, and the Scottish Executive.The spokesman said: “The Prime Minister does not regret for one minute doing what he could to try to change the decision. The Prime Minister believes it was absolutely right that he continues fighting to protect British jobs.

Sometimes that’s not going to work out.”Danny Carrigan, Scottish regional secretary of the Amalgamated Engineering and Electrical Union, said: “This is a real kick in the teeth for the workers. The whole Bathgate community depends on that plant and the area will now be destroyed. Motorola should hand back over £20m worth of grants the company has been given over the past two years. They are sacking the workers so we want the money back.”The Bathgate plant is the biggest single site of employment in Scotland and the job losses are the worst at a Scottish company since British Leyland phased out nearly 6,000 jobs with the closure of its truck plant in the same town between 1984 and 1986. Motorola workers who attended a meeting with management yesterday said they had been told redundancies would be spread over four to six months.The factory has fallen prey to market conditions exposed on 13 March when Motorola announced cutbacks of up to 7,000 jobs worldwide in the personal communications sector.

The company insisted it had reached the Bathgate decision after long and complex deliberations in which it weighed up “a huge number” of considerations. The firm said it had been a substantial inward investor in Britain for 34 years and expected to remain a major force in the UK electronics sector.The cross-party European committee in the Scottish Parliament vowed to launch an “urgent consultation” on workers’ rights and said it would seek the views of trade unions and industry bodies on the need for implementation of a draft European directive on information and consultation in the work place. The Scottish TUC is strongly in favour of the directive, which would force companies to consult on plans for redundancies, closures and mergers.Bathgate workers said they were dismayed that Motorola’s plant at Flensburg, Germany ­ where trades unions are represented inside the plant ­ is remaining open while the Scottish factory, where union access has been denied, is to close.The downturn in the electronics industry could result in further job losses in Northern Ireland. The Ulster Unionist MP William Ross warned yesterday that after the loss of 1,000 electronics jobs in the province, 150 more could soon be axed at AVX in Coleraine.. The French media giant Vivendi Universal and Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation agreed yesterday to merge their heavily loss-making Italian pay-television businesses, Telepiu and Stream, in an attempt to crack what has been a disappointing market.

The French media giant Vivendi Universal and Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation agreed yesterday to merge their heavily loss-making Italian pay-television businesses, Telepiu and Stream, in an attempt to crack what has been a disappointing market.
Vivendi’s TV unit, Canal Plus, would hold two-thirds of the new entity, to be called Telepiu, with News Corp taking the rest, Vivendi’s chairman, Jean-Marie Messier, announced yesterday.The European Commission will now decide whether the merged entity, which will dominate the relatively undeveloped market in Italy, breaks anti-competition rules.Analysts said the merger could trigger similar deals, in Spain among other countries.News Corp will have an option to increase its share of Telepiu to 50 per cent in 18 months. But this might depend on how well Mr Messier and Mr Murdoch, who have had a frosty past, work together. Richard Jones, media analyst at UBS Warburg, said: “It will be interesting to see whether it works with them as partners or whether they’ll say, ‘Forget it’… I’m surprised at the speed they’ve been able to agree, given that their track record is pretty poor.” Talks began just one month ago.Vivendi built up a 20 per cent stake in Murdoch’s BSkyB but must sell it as a condition set by Brussels for approval of Vivendi’s merger with Canada’s Seagram.Telepiu’s loss in the last year was 220m euros (£137m) and Stream’s was 400m euros.. I lost my job a few months ago. The company I worked for, a dot venture called eCountries, was there on Tuesday afternoon and so was my job I know it was I was doing it. By Wednesday morning, it had disappeared, along with those of about 50 other people.

I wandered around the office for a few days, looking for it like a lost sock; but it had definitely gone

I lost my job a few months ago. The company I worked for, a dot venture called eCountries, was there on Tuesday afternoon and so was my job I know it was I was doing it. By Wednesday morning, it had disappeared, along with those of about 50 other people. I wandered around the office for a few days, looking for it like a lost sock; but it had definitely gone.
The dot meltdown has stirred many emotions: schadenfreude and satisfaction among those who thought the whole thing was nothing more than an organised racket; despair and grief among those who have lost jobs and money My predominant emotion was none of those: it was puzzlement.