Historic Sheffield factory closes

Bosses confirmed production at the Shepcote Lane factory would stop, with 84 of 89 employees losing their jobs.

It comes after '˜significant long-term declines in volumes' which saw operations running at a loss.

Staff who contacted The Star said the company planned to scrap or move machines to Belgium, where its parent company is based.

Betafence director, Andrea Bori said: 'We have taken the difficult decision to end production at our Sheffield site as part of a broad strategic review of our manufacturing facilities to enable Betafence to design an efficient, high quality manufacturing network which can sustainably serve our customers to the highest standards.

'Over the past few years our UK operations were experiencing significant long-term declines in volumes and was running at a loss.  

'We remain committed to serving the perimeter protection market with our world leading products but will do so based on our quality and our innovative global solutions."

The Sheffield factory produced fence panels, agricultural fencing and industrial mesh and became part of Betafence in 1989.The closure follows years cut backs. It closed the Sheffield Road factory in 2006, where it had had operations since 1933. Ikea now stands on the site. At the time it employed 400 and blamed cheap competition from abroad  for a decline in demand for chain link fencing and '˜woven' wire products. In 2009, operations in Wigan closed and in 2016 it cut 100 jobs at Shepcote Lane as part of restructuring plans.