As the person below who was present for the Charnwood closure (but no longer working for AZ) I can only say the following. AZ may seem ruthless regarding cuts and closures but then what is the alternative given the state of the companies pipeline and existing patents?
Regarding the handling of the redundancies at Charnwood, not only was employment law adhered to but they went way beyond. We were informed of the closure in March 2010 and people were allowed to leave anytime from Sep 2010 up to Dec 2011 with full redundancy payment so undeniably pretty flexible. From March 2010 onwards we were officially allowed to spend 20% of our time on job-hunting and unofficially much more than that got approved, we were given free CV writing and interviewing courses, job fairs were arranged on-site and we were given a cash allowance to spend on training. Concerns were raised regarding TUPE but we were told categorically it would not apply, and it didn't. And as for those in the 50 - 55 age group that had a pension that would've kicked in at 50 with no reduction on redundancy. That only changed because UK pension law changed prohibiting pension payments below age 55 so blame George Osbourne for that one not AZ. That notwithstanding, attempts were made to find interim positions for those people to tide them over to 55
There are clearly some bitter ex-AZ employees out there and I guess it's understandable as the Charnwood closure disrupted a lot of settled lives, mine included but the reality is that the redundancies themselves were handled in a way that went way-beyond anything you're likely to experience elsewhere.
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