Kraft set to seal Cadbury takeover deal

The cash-and-shares deal, recommended by the Cadbury board two weeks ago, values the UK firm at around 11.4bn.

Cadbury employs 800 people at its UK sweet factory in Sheffield.

Shareholders have until 1pm today to accept the Oreos-to-Toblerone maker's offer, which would end the independent heritage of Cadbury stretching back to 1824.

To win control, Kraft must gain support from those holding a straightforward majority of the shares - or else it is not allowed to make another bid for the firm for a year.

If its offer is accepted by investors holding 75 per cent or more of the stock, it can delist the company's shares from the London Stock Exchange.

Today is also the last day for another potential bidder to enter the fray - which would restart the 60-day takeover timetable - although this is extremely unlikely after US firm Hershey and Italian chocolatier Ferrero both ruled themselves out of the running.

Kraft hopes that its takeover will create a "global confectionery leader", making the combined group world number one in the chocolate and sugar confectionery market and "a strong number two" for chewing gum.

Cadbury was first approached by Kraft last August but accused it of trying to buy the firm "on the cheap" with its lower original offer. The board relented two weeks ago when Kraft upped its bid.

Cadbury employs around 45,000 people in 60 countries, with 5,600 staff at eight manufacturing sites in the UK and Ireland, including a facility in Somerdale near Bristol, which is currently scheduled to close, as well as its Bournville factory in Birmingham.

Unions and Birmingham MPs have voiced concerns over the danger to British jobs from a takeover that could saddle the combined company with mammoth debts.

Cadbury workers will lobby the Government today for support to win jobs and investment guarantees from their new employer amid claims by union officials that the US firm had remained "silent" on the workforce's future.

Hundreds of members of Unite will urge the Government to ensure that pledges to the workforce from the new owners were more than "warm words".

Jack Dromey, deputy general secretary of Unite, said: "Our fear is that the Kraft takeover is not in the national interest, and in the months of this hostile takeover process we have heard nothing from Kraft to calm fears that it is in the interest of the Cadbury workforce either.

"Instead, the fate of manufacturing workers in Terry's of York, who found that Kraft ownership saw their plant close, weighs heavily on the minds of the Cadbury workforce.

"Kraft cared little for the great history of that plant or for the skills of its workforce so we must seize the opportunity now to ensure that Cadbury and its workforce do not suffer the same fate.

"The Government must secure meaningful pledges from Kraft, and police them so that Kraft cannot again walk away from a UK workforce.

Ministers must make it abundantly clear that closures and mass redundancies will not be accepted by the British Government or the British people.

"The Government has said, and rightly so, that we must rebuild our manufacturing base. It is simply wrong, however, that hostile takeovers of successful British companies can happen."