Further jobs to go at Imerys

Deteriorating conditions in the paper industry are responsible for the loss of a further 42 jobs at Imerys’ St Austell paper operations, the company said today, taking the full two-year headcount cull to 639 at the multi-national China clay producer.

The 42 white collar jobs include positions in marketing, distribution, R&D, purchasing and engineering follow the loss of 593 production jobs across Devon and Cornwall completed in December last year.

Imerys spokesperson Ivor Bowditch told MQR today that given the skills levels of the workers involved, some would be given the opportunity to work at other centres at the firm’s overseas operations.

He said every effort will be made to achieve redundancies through early retirement and voluntary redundancy but said compulsory redundancy would probably be necessary.