PSA Peugeot Citroen is to meet with trade unions next week to discuss the future of some of the French carmaker’s plants, including the Aulnay-sous-Bois factory outside Paris, which the company has already assured the government will not close.
However, the CGT union says Aulnay’s future is still in the balance, as is Sevelnord in northern France and PSA’s Madrid factory.
Last week PSA apparently ruled out closing Aulnay. French Industry Minister Eric Besson said that the carmaker’s chief executive officer Philippe Varin had given him assurances for the plant’s medium-term future.
The plant, which makes the Citroen C3, employs 3,600 people. CGT trade union representative for Peugeot, Jean-Pierre Mercier, said an extraordinary works council meeting will take place next Thursday, June 23.
He told the Reuters News Agency: “On the agenda are Aulnay-sous-Bois, Sevelnord and Madrid as well as the planned closure of a shock absorber workshop, which involves 600 people.”
Sevelnord employs 2,800, and Madrid 2,500 staff. Leaked documents on French websites say PSA has plans for “capacity adjustment” and Mercier fears they could bode factory closures.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Discover B2B Marketing That Performs
Combine business intelligence and editorial excellence to reach engaged professionals across 36 leading media platforms.
Fewer than 200,000 cars were produced at Aulnay last year against 400,000 annually in the middle of the last decade, Mercier said.
At next week’s meeting the union will ask PSA to put in writing that it agrees to keep all jobs for the workers at Aulnay at least until 2016.
That year coincides with the general lifespan of the Citroen C3 which was launched in 2009. Aulnay was opened in 1973 to replace the historic site at Javel, Paris.
