London Gateway, the new 6-berth container port now under construction on the Thames estuary at Corringham (next to the Coryton refinery) is advertising for senior staff.The port, which is due to open towards the end of 2013, says it is looking for civil engineers, a logistics park project manager, an equipment manager, a dock master and an operations planner, and says that around 100 key workers will be taken on in the next few months, with thousands of vacancies due to be filled from the middle of 2013 onwards. London Gateway plans to employ 12,000 people directly when completely up and running, and its supporting logistics park may employ up to 20,000 people with anothor 20,000 employed in support industries outside the port area.
Felixstowe insiders have expressed concern that many of the London Gateway jobs and ship calls will result in direct losses to Felixstowe Port.
London Gateway’s Commercial Manager Peter Ward has claimed that the DP World facility will prove to be a more attractive alternative to neighboring Felixstowe. “Our promise is to provide 40 percent improvement in productivity compared with existing ports,” he said recently
“This will be about increased schedule reliability leading to shorter transit times and compressed lead times compared with Felixstowe, especially in high wind situations when Felixstowe has to close – given our location, that will happen less often here,” he added.
The Telegraph Newspaper recently noted that DP World has continually refused to talk about its prospective customers, except to say that it is confident about the commercial viability of the project. Simon Moore, London Gateway’s chief executive, said: “People who are coming have concerns over how they may be treated in between time if we make their names public now.”
But it has recently become known that Uniserve, the largest British privately owned international freight and logistics company in the UK, is planning to build 1m sq ft of warehousing in the logistics park, though the move is not expected to undermine the company’s proposals also to expand at London Gateway’s main competitor Felixstowe, where it is also investing heavily.
http://www.felixstowenews.tv/