Metalworkers union IG Metall on Friday said it had approved a labour deal hammered out with Volkswagen for the car maker’s six western German plants that allows for longer working weeks.

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“The compromise has been signed,” the union’s chief negotiator for VW, Hartmut Meine, said in a statement cited by Reuters after a wage commission voted in favour of the agreement.


The deal reportedly creates a flexible work week corridor of between 25 and 33 hours a week for VW-brand workers at its western German plants – in exchange, the company has pledged concrete investments for each of the six factories that secures jobs beyond the end of 2011.

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