Aerospace giant Airbus has confirmed nearly 300 jobs will be axed at its Filton plant as part of a major group-wide redundancy programme.
The European planemaker announced plans earlier this week to reduce its UK workforce by 1,700 by the end of next year as it grapples with a massive impact of the coronavirus pandemic on the global commercial aviation industry. 
As a result, it said the cuts would fall on its commercial aircraft division.
Yesterday Airbus confirmed Filton’s sister plant at Broughton, North Wales, would bear the brunt of the job cuts with 1,400 of its 6,000-strong workforce facing the axe.
Some 295 posts will go at Filton, pictured, where 4,500 people work. Filton employees are mainly engineers designing wings, landing gear and fuel systems for its commercial airliners, although work is also carried out on its military aircraft which has not so far been affected by the Covid-19 pandemic.
In a statement Airbus said: “This split reflects the significant impact the Covid crisis has had on the UK’s commercial aircraft manufacturing activities which are concentrated in Broughton.
“Airbus will continue to meet regularly with its trade union partners in the UK in order to identify solutions that will help us implement this adaptation while minimising the social impact of the Covid-19 crisis on the company.”
In March Airbus announced a cut in commercial aircraft production by a third, extending its Easter shutdown and putting some workers on furlough as it sought to prepare for a marked slowdown in new orders from airlines impacted by the near collapse in global air travel.
At the time Airbus warned that it was “bleeding cash at an unprecedented speed”. 
Earlier this week chief executive Guillaume Faury, pictured, said it was facing its “gravest crisis” ever experienced by the aerospace industry and that it did not expect air traffic to get back to pre-pandemic levels until 2023 at the earliest.
Wing parts designed and built at Filton and Broughton and a plant in Bremen, Germany, are transported to aircraft assembly plants in Toulouse, France, Hamburg in Germany and Seville, Spain, under Airbus’s Europe-wide manufacturing process.
Manufacturing union Unite slammed the job losses as “yet another body blow to the entire South West economy” – and warned the eventual jobs toll could be much higher.
It said for every job lost at an employer such as Airbus, a further four jobs are lost in the supply chain.
Unite regional secretary Steve Preddy said: “We are very fearful that the reality is that some 1,500 jobs could be lost from the South West aerospace sector.
“Jobs are being shed at a rapid rate as a direct result of the government’s failure to provide specific support to the UK’s world-class aerospace sector needs to help it recover from this pandemic.
“Unless the government intervenes and provides specific support to the sector, similar to the support that France and Germany has given to their aerospace industries, then further job losses are inevitable.
“It is essential that all the region’s politicians come together at this critical time to press the government to give this sector and our region the support so desperately needed.
“The South West aerospace is world class in its standing and of crucial importance to the region’s efforts to recover post pandemic. We appeal to the government, do not let it be lost on your watch.”
The Covid-19 pandemic had already hit Bristol’s aerospace sector with 50 jobs going at Rolls-Royce’s aero-engine plant at Filton and GKN Aerospace, which assembles wing parts for Airbus and other planemakers on the same site at Filton, seeking an unspecified number of redundancies.
Labour’s shadow transport secretary Jim McMahon called for more government support for the UK aerospace sector.
“Labour has consistently called for an extension to the furlough in the most impacted industries, and a sectoral deal that supports the whole aviation industry including securing jobs and protecting the supply chain, while continuing to press for higher environmental standards,” he said.
A government spokesman said: “We understand this will be a difficult time for Airbus’s employees and their families, and we stand ready to support anyone affected in any way we can.
“We will continue to work closely with the sector to ensure firms are able to rebuild as the civil aviation market recovers.”
The job losses at Airbus showed the government needed to do more to help the sector, UK aerospace lobby group ADS chief executive Paul Everitt said
“Being the largest commercial aircraft company in the UK, Airbus is central to our aerospace industry and has a close relationship with its highly integrated UK supply chain.
“This difficult news will be unsettling for their employees and those working as part of the supply chain,” he said.
