Jean Martin Folz, Chief Executive Officer of PSA Peugeot Citroën, has today announced to staff and trade unions that it is the group’s intention to cease activity at its Ryton (near Coventry), UK, manufacturing facility in the West Midlands in 2007.
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PSA said that the decision follows a detailed study undertaken internally during the first quarter of 2006 of the plant’s industrial cost effectiveness. The study ‘clearly confirmed the weaknesses for the Ryton plant – high production and logistical costs – which mean that the Group is unable to justify the investment needed for the production of future vehicles’, PSA said.
PSA said in a statement that these internal factors, together with reduced demand and intense competition in Europe, have led the group to come to this ‘difficult conclusion’, having already reduced production at a number of other European sites at the end of 2005.
The firm said that its ‘proposal’ is that production at Ryton is brought to a close in two phases; in the first instance the factory, which today operates two shifts, moves to a single shift in July 2006, with production not continuing beyond mid-2007. Some 2,300 jobs are affected.
Having presented the proposal to its staff at the plant, PSA will now enter into consultation with the trade unions concerned. PSA added that it remains committed to its social responsibilities and will work closely with trade unions and government throughout the coming months to provide a comprehensive support package for its staff and to help as many as possible to find alternative employment.
Ryton was built by the Rootes Group around the outbreak of World War Two in 1939 as a ‘shadow’ aircraft engines factory, supplementing the automaker’s then main plant in Coventry, which was later bombed substantially. After the war, it produced a variety of Rootes passenger cars under such brands as Hillman, Singer and Sunbeam. Ownership passed into Chrysler hands for a time in the 1960s before acquisition by PSA. Peugeot production began with the 309 in the mid-’80s and the plant also built the 405 and 306.
It has concentrated on the 206 since 2001, building almost all right-hand drive models and a substantial number of LHDs. It has also built most 206 SW wagons and specialist versions of the 206 hatchback such as the glass-roof Roland Garros.
Ryton output of the 206 totalled 130,000 vehicles in 2005. The plant includes a body-in-white unit, a paint shop and a body subassembly line.
