A whopping 500 million bricks, enough to build 50,000 homes, sit unused - as the UK’s largest brick maker mothballs a West Midlands plant, GMB reveals today [Monday].
The bricks, which are enough to build two Kidderminsters, are stacked up at depots across the country.
Meanwhile Wienerberger has announced plans to close their Hartlebury plant in the West Midlands.
Just two years ago, the Government promised 1.5 million new homes by the end of the decade, with current projections showing this target is likely to be missed by hundreds of thousands.
Workers from the industry will today [Monday] address the Trade Union Congress in Brighton, warning that unless the Government comes good on its housebuilding promises, more jobs will be put at risk.
Lewis Parmenter, Brickworker and GMB member, told TUC Congress:
"Right now, there are 500 million bricks sat unused in factory yards across this country. You heard it right – 500 million bricks just sitting there. That is enough to build 50,000 average-sized houses – or ten small towns. Enough to provide homes for hundreds of thousands of people.
"But without spades in the ground to build the homes we need, our industry will collapse and eight thousand jobs will go: including mine.
"An industrial strategy for housing is not complicated. If we don’t build the homes, then the bricks don’t get sold. They just sit there in the yards. And we can’t make more bricks if the current stocks aren’t being bought.
"The factory I work in has had six shutdowns in three years and another factory mothballed. Other brickmakers Ibstock and Forterra are already making redundancies – and we’re really worried we could be next in line.
“And what happens when the jobs go? Our towns go with them.”
