GENERAL
MOTORS AND FORD
CUT THOUSANDS OF JOBS IN EUROPE
General Motors and Ford are planning to cut thousands of jobs
in Europe. GM, the world’s largest vehicle maker employing 380,000 in 50
countries, says that although it produced 8.3 million vehicles in 1999, its
$5.7 billion profits do not meet expectations and it is slashing 5,000 jobs in
Europe on top of the 10,000 announced in the U.S. following in a huge
restructuring plan. The job cuts represent about 10 percent of GM’s total
workforce in Europe. Output of the Vectra family automobile at its Vauxhall
plant in Luton, England will end in the first quarter of 2002, resulting in
2,000 jobs losses. But British unions, who have pledged to fight the decision
to end production of the Vectra, warn that up to 10,000 jobs could go because
of the knock-down effect among sub-contractors and suppliers.
Meanwhile, Ford, the UK’s biggest car maker and the world’s
second biggest is to halt car assembly at the once-mighty Dagenham plant to
the east of London. Production is to stop from 2002 with 4,000 redundancies.
Ford and its subsidiaries, which employ 50,000 in Britain, are seeking to
reduce its manufacturing workforce by 10 percent as part of a wide-ranging
cost-cutting plan. Over the last few years Ford of Europe has reduced its
workforce by 6 percent annually through voluntary redundancy and early
retirement schemes.
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IRISH
STRIKERS SUCCESSFULLY
CHALLENGE AGREEMENT
Irish unions have agreed to accept the continuation of the
country’s three-year national pay pact after the employers offered another 3
percent wage hike over the next two years. The agreement follows several
one-day strikes across a series of industries — the first after a decade of
cordial industrial relations. The stoppages were seen as the most serious
threat so far to Ireland’s 13-year "social partnership" basis of
social relations.
The unions participate in a national agreement called the
Program for Prosperity and Fairness (PPF), which sets an annual level of wage
increases for three years. But a growing number of unions were dissatisfied
with unexpectedly fast rising inflation, saying that they would pull out of
the PPF if claims for higher pay were not met. The PPF set a 5.5 percent wage
hike in both 2000 and this year and 4 percent in 2002 — the last nine months
of the agreement. This was based on projected annual inflation of 3 percent.
But inflation rose by 7 percent, a 15-year high and the unions fought for —
and won — the new increase.
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FIRST
STRIKE IN 20 YEARS
FOR UK ROLLS ROYCE WORKERS
Engineering workers at Rolls Royce, the aerospace and marine
engines group, have waged a strike prompted by the company’s decision to
switch the research and development of gas turbines for power stations to
Montreal. The strike, the first for 20 years in a plant with a calm industrial
relations record, surprised industry observers. The move is part of Rolls
Royce’s global restructuring plan in which it is to downsize 5,000 of its
40,000 employees in the next three years despite good annual profits and huge
new contracts.
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HEALTHCARE
WORKERS
STRIKE AT GERMANY’S
HEALTH REFORMS
Medical practices in Germany’s capital, Berlin, closed down
when doctors and medical staff waged a week-long strike in protest against the
German administration’s health reforms which came into effect at the
beginning of this year. But the protest had been simmering until health
secretary Andrea Fischer pegged health spending to scale back the number of
drugs paid for under the country’s health insurance system. The health
service, which is funded by equal contributions from citizens and their
employers, covers 90 percent of the population. Ms. Fischer’s reforms also
include cutting the average length of stay in hospital. The move is strongly
resisted by hospital employees. Doctors and nurses claim that the savings
being sought in the health service will lead to more deaths.
Germany’s health budget has spiraled in the decade since the
re-unification of the German Federal and German Democratic Republics. The most
recent report by the United Nations’ World Health Organization put Germany
25th in the world health league of 191 countries in which France came top and
the United States, trailing the world’s major economies, 37th.
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FURTHER
FALL
IN FRENCH WORKLESS
French unemployment last year fell by 418,000 to reach
2,160,000 — a fall of 16.2 percent of the country’s working population.
But the number of people without work and seeking a job still stands at 9.2
percent of the total workforce. The recovery continues the progress of 1998
and 1999 following the defeat of the conservative congress and election of a
more pro-worker administration in May 1997. While the recovery has given a
boost to youth employment, it has been slower for employees over 50 and the
long-term unemployed. The national 35-hour working week legislation which came
into effect for some sectors of the economy last year has also been a positive
factor in job creation.
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UE News - 2/01
