unite Life
BY RYAN FLETCHER
‘Some wondrous stuff’ Unite’s Joe Passmore on working at Harland and Wolff
Harland and Wolff senior shop steward Joe Passmore, 57, remembers joining the historic shipyard’s workforce like it was yesterday.
Now Harland and Wolff has been saved, due to workers occupying the yard and preventing it being sold off on the cheap after the firm went into administration, Joe is focused on ensuring it provides decent skilled jobs for the next generation.
“My father worked at Harland and Wolff, my grandfather before that and my uncle and cousins. When I came out of fourth year in school in 1979, I turned 16 and rather than go into fifth year, my father says ‘you’re not going to school this year – you’re going to start at the yard so’,” recalls Joe.
“The irony of it is I remember the day I had to go for the interview and it was with the senior shop steward. You learned to be very skilful. The tradesman I worked with over the years, some of them were absolute artists. It was fantastic what they could do. Most of that has gone now, unfortunately.”
At its height, Harland and Wolff, whose cranes Samson and Goliath dominate the Belfast skyline, employed 35,000 people. Today, after decades of being run down, that number has dwindled to around 130.
Nevertheless the magic of working amongst such a tight-knit staff and the yard’s awe inspiring industrial majesty remains.
38 uniteWORKS Autumn 2019
“There’s something really special about being on a dark floor and walking underneath a ship just sitting on blocks. You’re actually having to stoop and it’s immense. It can be totally overwhelming. You find yourself going up through a hole in the middle of ship and climbing through a maze of metal skeletons,” explained Joe.
“We did a job three years ago, repairing a huge ferry, down in Rosslare at the southern tip of Ireland. We had to work to on this ship while it was in dock. I found myself with an oxyacetylene cutting machine in the bowels of the ship. When I was cutting I could hear the sea boil on the other side. There’s some wondrous stuff that you wouldn’t experience anywhere else.”
The important thing for Joe now is that Belfast’s young people are given the opportunity to learn the skills needed to continue the yard’s work well into the future.
He said, “The whole of British industry is all suffering because short term profit is more important than long term viability. You only get long term viability if you have a production line of work and you can start bringing young people in. That’s only way you can continue skills.
“Learning and using those skills to actually make things is such a satisfying experience and I know there are a lot of kids who would thrive here. When this shipyard is reborn that’s my number one target – to try and build that legacy for Harland and Wolff again.”
Mark Thomas
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