Opel chief, Carl-Peter Forster, has said that a further reduction in the Opel workforce cannot be ruled out.
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Forster told the German weekly news magazine, Wirtschaftswoche, that global competition in the automotive sector requires on-going productivity improvement. If this does not come from higher volumes, then it has to come from a reduced workforce.
At the moment GM Europe is in discussion with unions at the Bochum, Antwerp and Ellesmere Port plants about cutting back Astra production by reducing a shift.
According to Wirtschaftswoche, Astra sales are ahead of target, but the model is in the second half of its model cycle and demand will therefore inevitably decline.
Forster said that it is possible that in the future Rüsselsheim could produce cars for Saturn.
When the next generation Vectra goes into production from 2008, the platform architecture will be used for a number of different variants, including models for other brands, such as Saturn, which is being developed as a sister brand to Opel, as is Vauxhall in the UK.
This should help utilise all capacity at Rüsselsheim, added Forster.
