Having worked in various steel fabrication companies Palmers and Octavious Atkinson in Harrogate plus one in Bolton and one in Sherburn in Elmert.

Palmers was years behind in taking up new working practices.
OA&S did not change quick enough and closed after I had been there 24 years. They may have been able to survive if it had not been for the 1988 crash of the London building boom.

As is always the case the new kids on the block do things cheaper. Also the. Workforce became more adaptable to changes and work practices.

You cannot blame the employers all the time, in a lot of cases the workers prevented changes. Read the Union men.

Some of the Union men really pushed for modernisation and the employers put up the money to do so.

The basic problem on the Tyne was that it was too narrow to build the vessels that were required.

Allan C.