It comes only two weeks after the announcement of a consultation on the closure of the Ethicon plant in Livingston by parent company Johnson & Johnson, which could see 400 jobs lost.
As a result, Gordon has written to Business Minister Paul Wheelhouse, expressing concern about the impact on workers and the wider community.
He has also probed the investment made by Scottish Enterprise into the initial expansion of the Jabil plant in June 2015, which saw £450,000 given to the company as part of the £12.5 million overall investment. The First Minister had previously visited the Jabil headquarters in New York in relation to the deal.
Now, less than two years after that investment, it appears the jobs that were created in 2015, and more, are set to be lost.
Gordon has written to the Minister asking more about the deal and about why the developing situation at the site has been allowed to happen so soon after the investment took place.
Gordon commented:
“Taxpayers will rightly be surprised to have heard the news late yesterday that the investment, announced less than two years ago, has been torn up, along with 260 jobs.
It is imperative that local jobs are prioritised by the Scottish Government and I welcome calls made by my colleague Miles Briggs for a jobs task force to be set up in Livingston.
But I think it’s also worth questioning that initial investment that was made. I support the work of the enterprise agencies in Scotland in attracting inward investment; it is important that steps are taken to grow our economy.
However, the deals that are secured, and the money that is handed over, must ensure some sort of longer term stability for local people and local communities. It is quite astonishing that almost half a million pounds was handed over less than two years ago and now the very same workers will find themselves without a job by the end of the year.
I think the Government needs to explain why this has happened so that lessons can be learned for the future.”