{"id":14868,"date":"2018-03-23T17:02:50","date_gmt":"2018-03-23T17:02:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/unitelive.org\/?p=14868"},"modified":"2020-11-12T12:59:05","modified_gmt":"2020-11-12T12:59:05","slug":"into-a-sea-of-uncertainty-gkn-shareholders-asked-in-effect-to-take-a-leap-in-the-dark","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/?p=14868","title":{"rendered":"\u00e2\u20ac\u0098Into a sea of uncertainty\u00e2\u20ac\u2122"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"fb-root\"><\/div>\n<p>In the latest twist in the attempt to take over the world class GKN, Unite has accused turnaround firm Melrose of asking GKN shareholders to take \u00e2\u20ac\u0098a leap in the dark into a sea of uncertainty\u00e2\u20ac\u2122.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>The comments come after Melrose lifted a self-imposed deadline for approval of its debt-fuelled takeover by US authorities ahead of the close of the shareholder vote on Thursday March 29.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Melrose had made its hostile takeover bid for GKN dependent on approval from the Committee on Foreign Investment in the United States (CFIUS), which has the power to hold up takeovers on the ground of national security. But today (March 23) Melrose said it was waiving this requirement, as it has still not had a final decision from CFIUS or the US Diplomatic Security Service (DSS).<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>GKN is a major defence partner to Airbus, Boeing, Lockheed Martin and supplies and maintains UK and US defence equipment. In addition to the Typhoon, GKN is also involved in the F-35 joint strike aircraft, as well as the Chinook and Black Hawk helicopter programmes.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p><strong><em>\u00e2\u20ac\u0098Debt-fuelled bid\u00e2\u20ac\u2122 <\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bMelrose is effectively asking shareholders to take a leap in the dark and back its debt-fuelled bid, not knowing if it will be held up by the US authorities on national defence grounds or whether it will retain customers,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 commented Unite assistant general secretary for aerospace Steve Turner.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>Turner continued, \u00e2\u20ac\u015bThere is every possibility that the US authorities will intervene in Melrose\u00e2\u20ac\u2122s bid on national security grounds. GKN is a major supplier to the US military and a key partner on defence programmes such as the F-35 joint strike aircraft in which the UK government has a stake.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bAdd the warnings by major customers such as Airbus about not being able to give GKN new work if Melrose succeeds, and you are left in a sea of uncertainty and instability.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bWe urge shareholders to back stable long-term relationships and investment in world class design, engineering and manufacturing that only GKN can provide, over the uncertainty of Melrose.<\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n<p>\u00e2\u20ac\u015bUnite also calls on\u00c2\u00a0the US authorities and UK business secretary Greg Clark to block the bid to protect the defence interests of the UK and US,\u00e2\u20ac\u0165 he added.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>In the latest twist in the attempt to take over the world class GKN, Unite has accused turnaround firm Melrose of asking GKN shareholders to take \u00e2\u20ac\u0098a leap in the dark into a sea of uncertainty\u00e2\u20ac\u2122. &nbsp; The comments come after Melrose lifted a self-imposed deadline for approval of its debt-fuelled takeover by US authorities [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":14699,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[624],"wps_subtitle":"GKN shareholders asked in effect \u00e2\u20ac\u0098to take a leap in the dark\u00e2\u20ac\u2122","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14868"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=14868"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14868\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":26313,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/14868\/revisions\/26313"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/14699"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=14868"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=14868"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/unitelive.test.igniteamt.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=14868"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}