Abbott gov kills 100yr ship building industry in Victoria - AMWU

In an act (or lack of acting) of what appears to be complete incompetence, the Abbott gov has overseen the end of the Victorian ship building industry. An industry 100 years old. The Abbott gov it seems couldn't get their act together to supply the industry with regular work. Either that or the jobs went off shore, I dunno. Whatever the case, it's a very sad time for nearly 1,000 highly skilled manufacturing workers in Victoria. Is this then where they're supposed to "get a good job that pays good money"?

A note on the video below BTW, there's a few seconds of the previous news before it gets to this story.

“We know that BAE wants to keep building ships here but they haven’t been given the chance. A lot of guys are devastated, we’ve got young members with families who are wondering what the future will hold for them.” 

Mr Thompson said this was the avoidable result of the Abbott Government’s mismanagement not only of this tender process, but of the entire shipbuilding industry. 

It had ample opportunity to save the local industry through a fourth AWD, two navy supply ships, new frigates or the patrol boats but all these projects had been offshored, dismissed or not brought forward despite the urgent need. 

AMWU delegate Jimmy Spence said: “A fourth AWD was what we hoped for. I started off building ships at age 16 in the UK, now I’m 44 and I don’t know what I’ll do,” he said. 

The union was in the Fair Work Commission this week to ensure the company consults each worker fairly in selecting the 100 redundancies due from next week. Over 300 skilled trades and 500 white-collar workers and staff are set to lose their positions in the next 6-9 months. more