Volkswagen has denied a report in the Spiegel newspaper at the weekend that the company may be seeking to cut a further 10,000 jobs, in addition to the 20,000 over three years already announced.
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The Spiegel said that VW personnel chief Horst Neumann had made the threat to union leaders. The jobs would go if Volkswagen decides to relocate some of the production of the next generation Golf away from Wolfsburg. He said that at current cost levels it is not possible to build the Golf profitably at the plant.
Volkswagen has already decided to build the new Scirocco in Portugal, on cost ground. The Spiegel report also speculated that the company should invest more in Brussels and Mosel to build more cars there.
In response to the Spiegel article Neumann told Reuters that the situation at the company is serious, but that there is no need to panic.
Last week Neumann told Reuters that that a lack of labour flexibility would endanger prospects for building the next Golf model at VW’s main plant in Wolfsburg.
“We want to keep building the car in Wolfsburg, but that is not conceivable under current economic conditions. We cannot move forward without a clear improvement, in labour costs as well,” he said.
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