European workers stage protests against job cuts

Bloomberg

Employees gathered to demand "a secure and viable future," IG Metall, the country’s biggest labor union, said on its Web site. The biggest rally in the Frankfurt suburb of Ruesselsheim attracted thousands of protestors.

"This is a crisis that can only be solved by means of joint action, not closures or layoffs," Rainer Einenkel, the works council chief at Opel’s plant in Bochum, said by phone.

Opel’s supervisory board will meet today to discuss reorganizing operations in Germany, based on talks between management and employees on how to prevent plant shutdowns and mass firings. The Detroit-based parent company is prepared to consider third-party partnerships and alliances for the European units, GM Europe President Carl-Peter Forster, Opel Management Director Hans Demant and regional works council Chairman Klaus Franz said in a joint statement Feb. 18.

Negotiations have been under way with the governments of Germany, the U.K. and Spain about aid for European operations. GM, the largest U.S. carmaker, aims to cut $1.2 billion from labor costs in the region and is seeking $6 billion in grants from governments abroad by 2010. GM has pledged to eliminate 47,000 jobs worldwide, including 26,000 outside the U.S.

Wide-ranging demands

"We demand loan guarantees, stakes taken by European governments, an opening up to new partners and investors, introduction of new corporate rules and management structures," IG Metall’s branch in the state of Hesse said in a pamphlet posted online.

Protests were also planned yesterday at GM factories in Austria, Belgium, France, Poland, Russia, Spain, Sweden and the U.K., as well as at other German plants.

Labor leaders’ calls for state aid are also backed by Germany’s Social Democrats, partners in Chancellor Angela Merkel’s coalition government. Finance Minister Peer Steinbrueck told Handelsblatt newspaper on Feb. 23 that helping Opel would be "more sensible" than letting the company fail and be forced to pay jobless car workers as much as 3 billion euros ($3.82 billion) a year in benefits.