PSA Peugeot-Citroen executive union, CFE-CGC, has stopped short of declaring ‘war’ on the automaker – in apparent contrast to other French labour bodies -following the announcement of huge redundancies that will see an initial 6,500 jobs axed.
However, CFE-CGC will attend an emergency meeting in Paris next week along with PSA’s other five unions, with Economics Redevelopment Minister, Arnaud Montebourg, to discuss the enormous scale of the redundancies that could see up to 8,000 posts disappear.
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Montebourg appeared live on French television programme, 20 Heures, last night, with the station showing copious images of angry PSA workers protesting volubly outside the Aulnay site in northern France, slated to be axed with the loss of 3,000 jobs.
However, it is the potential cumulative cull of up to 8,000 jobs with the supply chain knock-on effect, that has provoked the rage of several unions who are now mulling what action to take.
The most militant reaction has come from the Confederation Generale du Travail (CGT), which has apparently talked of unleashing ‘war,’ but a more conciliatory tone has been struck by PSA executive union, CFE-CGT, which is urging a more positive tone despite maintaining the automaker should have provided more information before.
“We are not organising a strike – what would that do?” CFE-CGT PSA union delegate, Anne Valleron, told just-auto from Paris. “For the moment no strike – it is not our style – our style is to find solutions.
“There is one union with which we are not in agreement – the CGT – that says we are at war – that can not happen. In a war there is collateral damage and executives do not [want] collateral war.”
Despite its reluctance to strike, the CFE-CGC is nonetheless organising a demonstration in Paris of all metalworker executives to vent their anger concerning PSA’s decision to axe Aulnay, massively reduce its Rennes plant and make 3,600 non-assembly workers redundant.
Management presented unions with a 300-page dossier yesterday outlining its intentions, with the labour bodies now forensically examining the huge document, line by line to see exactly where the axes will fall.
And despite PSA’s well-publicised over-capacity issues – along with most European manufacturers – the brutal extent of PSA’s decision has jolted even the moderate CFE-CGC.
“Surprised no – but the scale of what they decided [yes],” said Valleron, who stressed her union would seek compromise in apparent stark contrast to her other union colleagues.
“[In] a war there are injured and dead,” she said. “We are pragmatism, we analyse and we react.”
