Frankfurt am Main – There is still no solution in sight in the dispute over the planned job cuts at rail vehicle manufacturer Alstom. After more than a year of negotiations, accompanied by massive protest actions by the workforce, the most recent round of negotiations failed again. While the employee representatives have long presented constructive and sustainable alternatives to the planned cuts, the employers are sticking to their plans: layoffs and extensive wage cuts for the employees. The works council and IG Metall firmly reject this. They are calling on Alstom management to end its delaying tactics, to finally develop viable solutions for the German plants and to agree on a collective agreement that opens up prospects for the future. Otherwise there is a risk of fatal consequences – also with a view to the upcoming traffic turnaround, warns the employee representatives.
Jürgen Kerner, member of the board of directors of IG Metall responsible for the railway industry: “Without a strong railway industry and its clever minds, the traffic turnaround will not succeed. In order to achieve this goal, we need attractive engineering and manufacturing jobs. This is not possible with a wage cut and a lack of future prospects. Setting the wrong course is not an option for IG Metall. We expect Alstom to make a clear commitment to Germany as a rail location and to its own workforce.”
Jochen Homburg, chief negotiator at IG Metall: “After more than a year of intensive negotiations, it is abundantly clear that decisions must be made on the Alstom side that are not being made by the current negotiating group. We therefore need the involvement of management that is empowered to make decisions. The future is made of courage.”
René Straube, Chairman of the General Works Council for Alstom: “It is impossible for us to make concessions without making clear statements about the future, as Alstom envisions. There’s no way this will work. Where the future is written on it, the future must also be inside. We want to make the company better in the long term.”
Stefan Lüer, Deputy Chairman of the General Works Council for Alstom: “The German plants should be allowed to work to capacity fairly. Only plants that are working to capacity can really work productively. It is absurd that orders won here are often completely manufactured abroad. We demand real local content for the German locations when awarding public contracts. Because only that is fair and competitive.”
Background: In December 2021, ten months after Alstom took over Bombardier Transportation, Germany management announced a large-scale job cuts program because the affected locations were said to be structurally and long-term underutilized. The General Works Council and IG Metall were then able to use external expertise to prove that the announced savings could also be achieved through increases in productivity. Under the motto “better instead of cheaper”, they presented a concept that makes the locations competitive instead of unimaginatively wrecking them. In addition, the employee side was willing to make concessions: In the event that the productivity targets were not met, the resulting gap should be compensated for with contributions from the employees that could be measured objectively and controlled jointly. This was rejected by management.