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Hull Daily Mail prompts 700-worker walk out at BAE

By Press Gazette

The Hull Daily Mail launched a ‘Battle for Brough’ campaign today with this dramatic front page in response to BAE Systems’ announcement that 900 jobs are to go at the East Yorkshire plant.

The Northcliffe title is fighting to keep the Brough plant as a manufacturing facility following what Hull Daily Mail editor John Meehan described as a ‘damaging and short-sighted’decision by BAE.

Union officials yesterday helped the paper round up 700 workers at 12.15pm for the photo, taken by picture editor Jim Mitchell, which was aimed at showing the human cost of the redundancies.

The paper described the resulting image as a study of ‘pride, defiance and solidarity”.

The Mail’s campaign will now look to support the efforts of workers, trade unions and politicians to get BAE to reverse its decision.

‘They say a picture can say more than a thousand words,’said Meehan.

‘Well this is a case in point. It shows hundreds of skilled workers who could be cast into unemployment.

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‘How can it be right to shed so many highly-skilled jobs and close down a centre of manufacturing excellence when the Government says it is a priority to support the economy and rebalance it in favour of manufacturing?

‘The loss of so many jobs and manufacturing expertise and capability would be a disaster for East Yorkshire, but also a major blow to UK Plc.

‘We’re determined to do all we can to support the efforts to reverse this damaging and short-sighted decision.”

This is the second time the Mail has campaigned to save jobs at the Brough site.

In 2002 and 2003 it launched the ‘Sign It Now!’campaign, urging the Government to agree a £10bn contract to build a new fleet of Hawk jets for the RAF, which included a mass lobby of 700 workers from Brough to Westminster.

Earlier this year the Mail helped secure more than 150 new apprenticeships in the region after launching a campaign to get young people into work.

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