A few days after Jaguar Land Rover announced that it plans to cut 1,000 jobs at its Solihull plant in the West Midlands, it’s now Nissan’s turn to announce downsizing in Britain. Renault’s 43% shareholder announced Thursday its employees that it will launch a voluntary departure plan at its giant plant in Sunderland, in the north-east of the UK.
It has not advanced on the number of people who could be affected, but the British press mentions hundreds of positions. The plant, which produces 500,000 vehicles a year (the Qashqai, Juke or Leaf) and employs around 7,000 people, is one of the largest automobile factories in the country.
In question, the tumble of the British market , including diesel, whose sales continue to fall: they fell another 32.4% in March 2018, and one-third since the beginning of the year, in a market that has fallen overall in 12.4% in the first quarter compared to the first three months of last year. Nissan was particularly affected, with sales down 35% across the Channel in the quarter.
Not related to Brexit
“As we have already announced, we are preparing a new range of engines in the coming year,” said a spokesman for the company. “The resulting operational changes will result in a decline in engine production and volumes at Sunderland, in line with our business plan for 2018. We are discussing these changes with our employees. ” Diesel-fueled vehicles account for a quarter of Sunderland’s current production.
Nissan claimed that these ads were not related to Brexit, at least not directly. While the Sunderland plant exports 80% of its production, Carlos Ghosn, then CEO the Japanese manufacturer, had committed in October 2016, a few weeks after the vote, to build his new Qashqai, without knowing what commitments he had received from the British government.
A few weeks ago, Nissan Europe director Paul Willcox was still hoping in an interview with “Echos” that the ongoing Brexit negotiations would not penalize the sector. PSA announced for its part in early April that it would invest 100 million euros to increase the production capacity of its Luton plant, which now produces Opel / Vauxhall utility vehicles.