Jobs under threat at food firm in Dumfriesshire

A meat processing firm in Dumfries and Galloway is considering making up to 63 workers redundant.

Bosses at the Browns Food Group, in Kelloholm, upper Nithsdale, say they have seen a 25% decrease in turnover due to the coronavirus pandemic -and say they are now taking steps to 'support the long-term sustainability' of the business.

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A spokesperson from the group said: "This is devastating for us. We have only looked to invest in and grow the business over the last 25 years and are extremely proud of the way the business has developed and supports the livelihoods of the communities that we operate in.

However, we have had to face up to a New Reality of uncertainty when we consider the next twelve months and beyond. We must now take steps to support the long-term sustainability of our business.

"We are now having to look at additional ways to cut costs and one of the proposals we are looking at is headcount reduction and the possibility of redundancies.

"We are today announcing that we are entering into a period of collective consultation with the employees who may be impacted if we progressed the proposal at site to seek out ways of avoiding or mitigating this.

"No decision has been made at this time, and we will continue to look at ways of avoiding a redundancy situation throughout this period, however, if this is not possible and the proposal were to progress, then this would result in a number of roles being made redundant."