It is now more than seven years since the Phoenix Four made their promise to set up a trust fund for former MG Rover workers, when the company closed in 2005.
You may have seen the report in today’s Birmingham Mail about a High Court ruling against Phoenix Venture Holdings’ application for HBOS to disclose financial information relating to the disposal of 8,000 cars.
If you haven’t, it is worth reading – but it is also important to remember that this is a commercial dispute between Phoenix and HBOS. Whatever the outcome of this dispute, it does not change the Phoenix Four’s promise to their employees.
The Phoenix Four are wrong to make their former employees accept all the risk of the outcome of their commercial dispute. They should, instead, agree to shoulder some of the risk to the Trust Fund.
Carl Chinn is right, the Phoenix Four should personally put £1 million each into the Trust Fund for former workers. We should not pretend that this amount of money would change the lives of former workers – but it would help them, and the local community, to draw a line under the closure and move on.
