Insider Media Limited

Troubled trainmaker Bombardier has been given a lift with a £15m contract for ScotRail. The announcement was made during a visit to the Derby site by transport minister Theresa Villiers. However, workers at the plant said they were still "disappointed" that the minister refused to review the £1.4bn Thameslink contract.

Villiers visited Bombardier's UK site yesterday (14 November), where it was revealed the trainmaker would be given a small lifeline in the form of a £15m trainmaking contract. Under the three-year deal with ScotRail, Bombardier will create maintenance and parts for 177 trains.

However, unions and workers expressed their disappointment at Villiers' refusal to reopen the bidding for the government's lucrative Thameslink project, which was handed to German manufacturer Siemens earlier this year.

Bombardier soon announced it would axe up to 1,400 jobs after losing out on the multimillion-pound deal.

Speaking at the Derby site yesterday, Villiers said: "The government's determined to help Bombardier and Derby at this difficult time.

"That's why we've set up an economic taskforce which has been helping people affected by job losses and that's why only a couple of weeks ago the government gave provisional approval to a £40m regional growth fund bid to help Derby."

But union bosses described Villers' actions as "scandalous", and accused her of "dashing workers' hopes" by appearing at the site.

RMT general secretary Bob Crow added: "It's a scandal Theresa Villiers has travelled all the way to Derby to do nothing other than confirm the death sentence hanging over the thousands of jobs at Bombardier and in the supply chain. The Thameslink fleet contract still isn't signed off."

George Cowcher, chief executive of the Derbyshire and Nottinghamshire Chamber of Commerce, told Insider: "Today's announcement is good news for Bombardier in the short-term, but does little to address the long term issue of securing future jobs and increasing production capacity in the wake of Thameslink.

"Given what happened over the summer, the Government now has a duty, at the very least, to ensure that any new and existing contract opportunities are quickly identified and made available to Bombardier to bid for, along with delivering on its pledge to re-write its procurement rules to ensure that a situation like this, which puts UK manufacturing at a huge disadvantage, can never happen again."

Villiers cited high costs as the reason for refusing to review the Thameslink contract. She said a delay in starting the contract would be "costly" to taxpayers.

Last week, it was confirmed that the European Commission would not punish the UK coalition government if it decided to restart the Thameslink tender process.