Volkswagen’s Christmas wish: A deal with the union before the holidays
The management of car giant Volkswagen, which recently warned it could be forced to close several factories in Germany and cut many jobs, hopes to reach an agreement on a new collective agreement with the IG Metall union by Christmas.
However, VW insists that production capacity must be adapted to demand.
“I think there is a great desire on both sides that these employee talks do not wait under the Christmas tree,” said Dirk Grosse-Loheide, head of purchasing at VW, at the automotive industry conference, reports the German agency dpa.
Grosse-Loheide believes that VW is capable of finding its way to true competitiveness. As he pointed out, the company has emerged from every previous crisis even stronger. However, in his opinion, it is necessary to ensure a sustainable cost reduction.
He also explained that the lack of orders refers to more than 500,000 vehicles that they can produce in each of their factories.
“If there is no demand, we have to restructure our capacities and adapt them to the market situation. I don’t think we can avoid it. If we adjusted the capacities, we could operate with a high profit”, he assessed.
Business managers insist extensive cost-cutting will be needed to remain competitive. In IG Metall and the workers’ council, however, they have already committed themselves to a tough fight against plant closures or large-scale layoffs.
So far, the two sides have not been able to come to an agreement. IG Metall has already threatened strikes in December. A new round of negotiations for a new collective agreement is scheduled for December 9.
VW plans to close several factories in Germany and reduce the number of employees by several tens of thousands. VW employs about 120,000 people in Germany, where it has never closed a factory, and in the world it has not done so for more than three decades.
Source: Seebiz
Photo: Unsplash, Beta/AP
Source: bizlife.rs
