Caparo in crisis: Company has thrown us all in the gutter, say devastated workers

Mr Hartley was one of more than 50 former and current Caparo employees who turned up at the Job Centre in West Bromwich High Street on Saturday in a bid to find a new career. The Job Centre in Temple Street, Wolverhampton also opened up especially for Caparo workers, providing the same service.

Like hundreds of other Caparo employees in the Black Country, Mr Hartley was called into a meeting on Friday morning with administrators from PriceWaterhouseCoopers (PwC).

He was told that cuts had to be made and that along with 67 other staff at the firm's main depot he was being made redundant.

At the same moment in Darlaston, West Bromwich and Dudley, Caparo shut down its plants and laid off a total of 245 workers. Another 10 jobs went at the Cradley Heath CMT Engineering Plant.

"Nearly half a century and it was all over in five minutes," said Mr Hartley, aged 62, from Oldbury.

"We had no warning. It's gut wrenching to be treated like that. I don't know what, if anything, the company has done to try and stop this from happening.

"It's left a lot of people out of work and not really knowing where to turn."

Mr Hartley said that most staff were still shocked over the way the redundancies had been handled.

At all five effected Black Country sites, administrators announced the redundancies and gave workers an hour to collect their personal belongings and get off the premises.

Those who were off sick or on holiday found out through a text message or phone call from administrators.

Paul Mansell, 57, a quality control manager at Fairbright Wire in West Bromwich for 15 years, said that as far as he was aware no staff had been contacted directly by Caparo.

"We've had no letter telling us we were being laid off," said Mr Mansell, from Tipton. "In fact there has been no information from them at all.

"Hundreds of workers, a lot of whom have dedicated years of their lives to the job and they treat us with complete disdain.

"They'll say it's out of their hands and it's up to the administrators, but to me that's a disgraceful way to treat employees.

"At Fairbright we've never made a reported loss, yet 59 jobs have gone. Shame on them."

Andy Antill, aged 42, said he was nursing an injured leg at his home in Walsall when he was called by an administrator.

"It was a 30 second phone call," he said. "He told me I was redundant and that I could come in and collect my things. That was that.

"There's been a complete lack of information from Caparo. When the administrators came in we were told we'd be informed every step of the way.

"That hasn't happened. It's very poor really."

"They've thrown us in the gutter," added Rob Dolan, a long-time colleague of Mr Antill's at Caparo Precision Tubes in Oldbury.

"Between us we've done near enough 60 years there and now we're left with no job just in time for Christmas."

Cliff Farrington, 57, from Tipton, said he feared that many workers would struggle to find another job after being made redundant.

"A lot of us have worked at the same place for a long time and it's going to be hard to get work now," he said.

"I've come down here (to the Job Centre) more in hope than anything. The future is looking pretty bleak for a lot of us at the moment."

One worker, who asked not to be named, is one of a handful of staff that has been kept on at the West Bromwich plant.

"I've been told I'll be there for a few weeks to get the plant sorted out but they've not said what will happen after that," he said.

"It's inevitable that I'll be out of a job as well. We know the steel industry is in poor shape but the Government could have done more to support British workers."

Meanwhile administrators confirmed that no redundancies were planned at Caparo Bridge Aluminium in Wednesbury, Caparo Module Systems in Willenhall, Caparo Accles and Pollock and Caparo Tune Components, both in Oldbury.