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The Silberston Report was commissioned as an independent study of (i) and (ii), and notably to ensure that (ii) was not forgotten amid the attention given to (i).
Effect on UK textile and clothing industries
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4. The TC industries represent 2% of employment in the UK economy (9% of manufacturing industry). A factual brief on the industries is at Annex A. The MFA's purpose was to give a "breathing space" to developed countries' TC industries to permit the adjustment (ie both run-down and modernisation) necessary to enable them to face competition from the developing world, while at the same time permitting LDC exports to grow without causing disruption. In the UK there has certainly been a dramatic decline in both industries. Production in the textile industry fell by 40% between 1973 and 1983, and in the clothing industry by 15-20%. Employment by 1983 was only 48% of its 1972 level in textiles and 58% in clothing. Textile and knitting technology have become much more capital intensive, though clothing technology has not. The changes were fastest during the recession.
→ between 1978 21983
5. Professor Silberston considers that the surviving firms making cotton yarn and fabric, and woollen and worsted fabric should now be able to compete in an unrestricted market: so should those parts of the knitting industry which have reinvested sufficiently. But in clothing (whether made from woven or knitted fabric) where the progress of automation is slow, the industry will still find it hard to compete. However the industry themselves argue that although the MFA has encouraged modernisation, the process is not complete in any sector. The main trade associations are unanimous that an MFA with similar general effect to the present one will be necessary for at least ten years and probably much longer.
6.
The Silberston report forecasts that even if imports stay as tightly restricted as now, employment in the TC industries will fall by a further 150,000 by 1992: and that if import restrictions are lifted completely it will fall by a further 10,000 to 50,000. He expects higher imports from MFA sources to be mainly at the expense of other (currently unrestricted) foreign suppliers. In other words the main influence on employment will not be the treatment of LDC imports but the improvements in productivity which competition will anyway compel. (See paragraph 10 below on the ways TC import restrictions affect employment in the rest of the economy). The industry says Silberston's forecasts on job-losses due to productiv- ity changes is too high and that due to LDC imports too low.
employment
7. Regions where TC is concentrated are discussed in Annex B. The clothing industry is geographically dispersed: textiles and knitting are more concentrated. Knitting provides over 4% of total employment in the East Midlands, and is also important in the Border area of Scotland. Textiles provide over 3% of total employment in Yorkshire and Humberside. Textiles and clothing each represent almost 3% of total employment in Northern Ireland. There are of course greater concentrations in smaller areas: of the 323 travel-to- work areas in Great Britain there are 13 in which textile employment represents over 10% of all employment; there seem to be none in which clothing employment does. In clothing (though not in textiles) 70% of employees are women, and in knitting 80%. Thus knitwear emerges as the sector where employment is most geographically
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