General Motors Europe looked set to cut nearly 1,000 jobs at its Vauxhall factory in Ellesmere Port, Cheshire, after fraught talks with unions, Reuters reported.
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“It was a long and difficult discussion. We are going to announce the outcome on Wednesday after we have informed our workforce,” a GM Europe spokesman told the news agency on Tuesday of the talks that stretched into Monday night – he declined to say what had been decided.
Reuters noted that union officials have said they were not optimistic about stopping GM’s plans to cut jobs [one shift] at Ellesmere Port to boost productivity as sales of the ageing Opel/Vauxhall Astra wane.
Unions and GM management are scheduled to meet early on Wednesday at Ellesmere Port ahead of a formal announcement to workers, a source familiar with the situation told Reuters.
Chancellor of the Exchequer Gordon Brown and Trade Secretary Alistair Darling were expected to visit workers at the plant on Wednesday if they were laid off, the source said.
Unions and the company were making plans for a news conference around 11:00 am, the source also said.
Reuters noted that GM Europe president Carl-Peter Forster said last week that proposals by unions to spread output cuts over other GM plants in Europe were “not super-attractive”. Factories in Belgium and Germany also make the Astra, GM’s top-selling car in Europe.
The head of GM’s European works council, Klaus Franz, was not available for comment. His office told the news agency a statement was planned for Wednesday.
Workers at the Vauxhall plant staged a spontaneous walkout in response to Forster’s comments last week, temporarily halting production.
