Barnoldswick is bracing for a severe financial hit if the factory, which occupies two sites in the town, is lost. Along with a Rolls-Royce nuclear-services business in north-west England, it contributes £1.1 billion a year to the region's economy, based on a 2017 study commissioned by the company.
Rolls-Royce traditionally makes its money from servicing its aircraft engines over years rather than their initial sale, income that's dried up with the biggest travel slowdown. It's also been saddled with the cost of meeting demand for new Airbus SE A350s while fixing glitches on turbines for those that power Boeing's 787s.
Ross Quinn, regional officer for aerospace at the Unite union, said that breaches a 2009 deal to balance output between the sites. Locating fan blade production solely in Asia also makes no sense when the engines are assembled at Rolls-Royce's main plant 130 kilometres away in Derby, central England, he said.
British inventor Frank Whittle shifted his work on the ground-breaking propulsion system to Barnoldswick in 1943 at a site acquired by Rolls-Royce well away from the attention of German bombers.