Latest news with #Reay
Fashion Network
2 days ago
- Business
- Fashion Network
Next abruptly closes owned Sri Lanka factory
UK fashion retail giant Next has 'abruptly' shuttered one of its three Sri Lankan factories with the loss of 1,400 jobs. A trade union official is quoted as saying that over 800 of its members were out of work, as the annoucement sparked protests, according to online publication EasternEye. Next Manufacturing – a subsidiary of Next – confirmed it is closing the factory in response to high operating costs. The factory in the island's Katunayake Free Trade Zone, just outside the capital Colombo, announced its immediate closure and promised severance deals to 1,416 workers made redundant overnight. David Reay, director of manufacturing at Next, said the plant had been unprofitable for several years and that he had no alternative but to close it. 'At the heart of this decision is the increasingly high operating cost of the Katunayake manufacturing plant,' Reay said in a statement, adding the company will continue to operate two other factories on the island. The Free Trade Zones and General Services Employees Union rejected the claim that the factory was unviable with its general secretary Anton Marcus saying: 'The decision to close without any consultation with us is a violation of a collective agreement.' Last month, Sri Lanka's apparel industry warned that threatened US tariffs would disrupt the island's largest export sector and place thousands of jobs at risk. The report said Sri Lanka exported $4.76 billion (£3.76 billion) worth of garments last year, up from £3.58 billion the previous year. The industry employs about 350,000 workers and is a key foreign exchange earner.
Fashion Network
3 days ago
- Business
- Fashion Network
Next abruptly closes owned Sri Lanka factory
UK fashion retail giant Next has 'abruptly' shuttered one of its three Sri Lankan factories with the loss of 1,400 jobs. A trade union official is quoted as saying that over 800 of its members were out of work, as the annoucement sparked protests, according to online publication EasternEye. Next Manufacturing – a subsidiary of Next – confirmed it is closing the factory in response to high operating costs. The factory in the island's Katunayake Free Trade Zone, just outside the capital Colombo, announced its immediate closure and promised severance deals to 1,416 workers made redundant overnight. David Reay, director of manufacturing at Next, said the plant had been unprofitable for several years and that he had no alternative but to close it. 'At the heart of this decision is the increasingly high operating cost of the Katunayake manufacturing plant,' Reay said in a statement, adding the company will continue to operate two other factories on the island. The Free Trade Zones and General Services Employees Union rejected the claim that the factory was unviable with its general secretary Anton Marcus saying: 'The decision to close without any consultation with us is a violation of a collective agreement.' Last month, Sri Lanka's apparel industry warned that threatened US tariffs would disrupt the island's largest export sector and place thousands of jobs at risk. The report said Sri Lanka exported $4.76 billion (£3.76 billion) worth of garments last year, up from £3.58 billion the previous year. The industry employs about 350,000 workers and is a key foreign exchange earner.
Fashion Network
3 days ago
- Business
- Fashion Network
Next abruptly closes owned Sri Lanka factory
UK fashion retail giant Next has 'abruptly' shuttered one of its three Sri Lankan factories with the loss of 1,400 jobs. A trade union official is quoted as saying that over 800 of its members were out of work, as the annoucement sparked protests, according to online publication EasternEye. Next Manufacturing – a subsidiary of Next – confirmed it is closing the factory in response to high operating costs. The factory in the island's Katunayake Free Trade Zone, just outside the capital Colombo, announced its immediate closure and promised severance deals to 1,416 workers made redundant overnight. David Reay, director of manufacturing at Next, said the plant had been unprofitable for several years and that he had no alternative but to close it. 'At the heart of this decision is the increasingly high operating cost of the Katunayake manufacturing plant,' Reay said in a statement, adding the company will continue to operate two other factories on the island. The Free Trade Zones and General Services Employees Union rejected the claim that the factory was unviable with its general secretary Anton Marcus saying: 'The decision to close without any consultation with us is a violation of a collective agreement.' Last month, Sri Lanka's apparel industry warned that threatened US tariffs would disrupt the island's largest export sector and place thousands of jobs at risk. The report said Sri Lanka exported $4.76 billion (£3.76 billion) worth of garments last year, up from £3.58 billion the previous year. The industry employs about 350,000 workers and is a key foreign exchange earner.
BBC News
10-03-2025
- General
- BBC News
Council bid to make walk and cycle to school safer in Wiltshire
A council has pledged to help pupils walk and cycle to school by funding bike storage and wider Council has launched its Taking Action on School Journeys programme, to make it safer to walk or cycle to school instead of parents and carers taking children by car. Councillor Tamara Reay, cabinet member for transport, said: "It improves health and wellbeing helping people to get some exercise, as well as improving air quality and reducing carbon emissions – and it can save money too."The programme, which includes grants to fund infrastructure, is open to all schools in the county. Ms Reay said there was "more to do" in this area and it was continuing to work with schools throughout the county "to make it easier for pupils to walk, cycle or scooter to and from school".The project includes "training a further 13,000 children this year to make their journeys safer", she added. The projects have so far included an upgraded zebra crossing outside Box Primary School, new bollards and flashing lights by Chapmanslade Primary School and an advisory 20mph limit outside Bitham Brook Primary schools expected to see upgrades made are Queen's Crescent Primary, Holy Trinity Primary Academy, Wyndham Park Infants School and the Stonehenge School.
The Guardian
07-03-2025
- Sport
- The Guardian
‘We swap ideas in the canteen': Sunderland united with men's and women's teams
Melanie Reay is leading the way through the maze of corridors inside the Academy of Light when a corner is turned and she almost collides with Régis Le Bris. The managers of Sunderland's women's and men's teams stop for a brief, friendly chat. It is a commonplace occurrence at this fully integrated, Premier League standard, first-team training ground where Jobe Bellingham, Enzo Le Fée, Wilson Isidor and the rest of Le Bris's players share facilities, the canteen included, with Reay's squad. Similar sorts of arrangements remain depressingly rare with too many men's managers paying lip-service to the importance of their club's women's side but would have palpitations at the idea of sharing a weekday HQ. 'A lot of training grounds are not integrated, or certainly not properly,' says Reay as she prepares to start explaining why Saturday's FA Cup quarter-final at Manchester United represents another staging post in the rebirth of Sunderland women. 'So it's really good that we're fully integrated, that we can share ideas during informal conversations with Régis and his staff. 'We swap ideas in the canteen and it reinforces the sense that we're all one club. 'We play broadly the same way as Régis's first team. We want the style and culture of both teams to be part of Sunderland's DNA and the facilities here are so good it's a big selling point in terms of what we can offer the girls.' The Academy of Light also introduces Reay to alternative thinking. 'You cross all sorts of paths with people every day here and have conversations about different ways of doing things,' she says. 'You gain loads of information. 'Régis is really interesting. He's really helpful and so, too, was Tony Mowbray [now in charge of West Brom] when he was Sunderland's men manager. I still talk to Tony.' As friends and colleagues on a pro licence coaching course due to conclude in June, Reay and her Manchester United counterpart, Marc Skinner, spent Monday and Tuesday attending the latest module. 'To be together a few days before a quarter-final is a bit unusual,' she says. 'But we enjoy a bit of banter.' While United endeavour to push the leaders, Chelsea, for the WSL title the youthful Sunderland are sixth in the Championship. 'Man Utd will be a tough test,' Reay says. 'A big challenge. But it's a different kind of pressure. No one's expecting us to win.' There was a time when Sunderland held their own in the top division. In the spring of 2018, at the end of Reay's first year in full charge, they finished seventh only for their world to collapse. With the men's club in financial difficulties and unwilling to provide the women's squad with the necessary funding, the Football Association declined to grant Sunderland a WSL licence and demoted them two divisions. 'It was very tough,' Reay says. 'I could easily have left and no one would have blamed me. But since then we've gone from amateur football to being fully professional so we've come a long way in a short time. Our ambition now is to get back into the WSL.' The hope is that Le Bris's side will return to the Premier League this spring and Reay's side reach the WSL a year or two later. ''We're not quite ready to go into the Super League yet,' Reay says. 'It's a different beast from a few years ago. It's really running away from the Championship so we need to be properly ready.' Sign up to Moving the Goalposts No topic is too small or too big for us to cover as we deliver a twice-weekly roundup of the wonderful world of women's football after newsletter promotion Although Sunderland's Championship neighbours Durham and Newcastle share similar ambitions, the nearest WSL team to the north-east is in Manchester, a 140-mile, trans-Pennine, drive. 'A lot of people in London think Manchester's 'the north' but there's a lot of England beyond it,' says Reay. 'It's quite sad you have to go so far south to watch top-level women's football live.' During her playing days, the 43-year-old was a prolific striker for Sunderland and Newcastle but unlike her cousin, Alan Shearer, she has stuck with coaching. Indeed during Phil Neville's tenure as Engalnd manager Reay joined the staff on a temporary basis but ultimately ignored FA overtures to swap club for international football. 'I enjoyed the Lionesses camps,' she says. 'But I prefer day-to-day involvement. 'I'm really passionate about developing young players and we've got a really strong academy here. Everyone knows about the England players – the Jill Scotts, the Lucy Bronzes, the Beth Meads – who began their careers at Sunderland but a new generation of internationals are starting to come through now.' Last month Reay briefly waved goodbye to a quartet as Mary McAteer and Ellen Jones headed off on senior international duty with Wales, Jessie Stapleton joined Ireland and Katie Kitching flew to Costa Rica with New Zealand. 'We're massive underdogs at Manchester United,' she says. 'But it's a one-off game so we can throw the kitchen sink at them.'
