The Belfast shipyard Harland & Wolff has announced that it is to shed more than half of its 1,200 workers by October 5th as part of a restructuring plan to make the ailing yard "leaner and more responsive."
The yard's chief executive, Mr Brynjulv Mugaas, said that while the redundancies were "highly regrettable and deeply painful", they had become necessary to restore market confidence and secure H&W's future.
"We need to match employment levels closely to confirmed workload. A leaner, more responsive and more productive shipbuilding and offshore construction business will be better placed to take advantage of emerging market opportunities and to counter the cyclical nature of ship-ordering patterns.
"We would hope to keep the redundancies implemented to around the level identified, but this will depend on achieving the major improvement in productivity coupled with the securing of major orders. This is the only way to ensure the company's future," Mr Mugaas concluded.
The yard's short-term future looked slightly brighter last week when the company succeeded in recouping £22 million sterling it was owed by a US customer, Global Marine, at an arbitration hearing in London.
But trade union representatives knew that job losses were inevitable. A doomsday plan leaked to a local newspaper talked of up to 1,000 redundancies. The yard's Norwegian-based parent company, Fred Olsen Energy, earlier outlined a "controlled closure" option if the arbitration ruling should go against the yard.
H&W's main problem is that it has no major orders. The yard has a signed letter of intent for a £300 million contract for four Ropax ferries for the Bahamas-based Seamasters International. The order is, however, not expected to be confirmed until November, with work starting next Easter at the earliest.
The North's First and Deputy First Ministers, Mr David Trimble and Mr Seamus Mallon, last night announced a task force to tackle the job losses at H&W. Describing the announcement as a "severe blow for east Belfast", the two Ministers pledged to do "everything in our power" to create new job opportunities.
The Minister of Enterprise, Trade and Investment, Sir Reg Empey, who will receive the task force's report, expressed "deep regret" at the redundancies. "I shall be meeting management, unions and political representatives to discuss the ramifications," he added.
The president of the Confederation of Shipbuilding and Engineering Unions, Mr Bobby Carson, said the exact numbers received by his union were 613 redundancies with 595 people retained by the company.
"The numbers are devastating as far as the workforce is concerned . . . With oil prices at the current levels there is potential for offshore work which H&W specialises in. Something has to be found to secure the future of shipbuilding and those people employed in it in Belfast," he said.