The news that Young’s Seafood has been sold to international private equity firm CapVest for an undisclosed fee will leave former workers at Pinneys of Annan wondering if the future of the site would have been different had the sale gone through before Pinneys closed, says South Scotland MSP Colin Smyth.

In an e mail to Colin Smyth, Young’s Seafood Chief Executive Officer Bill Showalter describes the sale of the company to CapVest, who own pork processing company Karro, as a “positive development”.

Young’s Seafood was put up for sale in April 2018, just weeks before the company confirmed the closure of their Pinneys of Annan site. The Pinney’s site eventually closed in August last year, with the loss of approximately 450 direct jobs and hundreds more agency and seasonal posts. The site was recently sold to food processing company Bhagat Holdings Limited who hope to begin production at the site in the autumn, with the creation of 100 jobs.

Young’s seafood continues to own and run a scampi factory in Annan.

South Scotland MSP Colin Smyth said, “The Chief Executive of Young’s Seafood may describe the sale of the company to CapVest as a positive development for them but sadly it’s a bit late for the former workforce who lost their jobs at Pinney’s when Young’s closed their door. Those ex-employees must now be thinking “what if” the company sale had gone through earlier, maybe the new owners would had very different thoughts on the Pinney’s site. At the very least the closure of Pinney’s should have been delayed until new owners for Young’s had been found and been given a chance to consider what they wanted to do about the future of Pinneys. However, that is all in the past and at least we have a new owner for the Pinneys site who are committed to restarting food production and creating at least 100 jobs. As far as Young’s is concerned the focus locally is very much on the scampi factory and I have written to Bill Showalter to ask that he sets out clearly as soon as possible what Young’s Seafood under their new owners, have planned for that factory and to seek assurances over its long term future and hopefully growth”.