DPA
Strikers in Leipzig: The factory is already closed at the end of March 2019
The automotive supplier Neue Halberg-Guss (NHG) will close its plant in Leipzig earlier and reduce more jobs in Saarbrücken. The company reacts to a weaker order situation due to the long conflict with the union IG Metall, said the management of NHG on Thursday in Frankfurt. The Leipzig location will be closed at the end of March 2019 instead of the end of 2019. And in Saarbrücken around 400 jobs would have been canceled by the end of March 2019 – so far there had been talk of a loss of 300 jobs.
A “forced capacity and job cuts” is now inevitable, said NHG. The order situation had “significantly worsened” compared to May, when the talks with IG Metall began. Customers placed orders with other suppliers and announced the withdrawal of further orders. The NHG assume that production will halve more than half by mid-2019.
In the past four months, the management had tried in vain to negotiate with IG Metall a social security agreement, it said. That was also one Mediator failed: In mid-September, the NHG had declared the arbitration failed. The reason was that the union had insisted on demands that would have driven the company into bankruptcy.
NHG does not find an investor
The mediation has been going on since the end of July – after about six weeks of strike. The outage had significantly worsened the capacity utilization of both plants after the restart of production, NHG announced. There are around 700 employees in Leipzig and around 1,500 jobs in Saarbrücken. The supplier of engine blocks and drive shafts is part of the Bosnian-German Prevent group of the Hastor family.
A parallel sales process is not progressing, explained NHG. There is an investor who has announced several times to submit an offer, said the spokesman for the management. “But he has not done so far.” The owners of the NHG are in agreement with a first bidder, which was mediated by the Saarland Ministry of Economic Affairs. However, the investor did not receive any support from customers and IG Metall and therefore withdrew.
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The NHG stated: “We greatly regret the now necessary job cuts.” He was not only painful for the affected employees. After the “dramatic loss of orders”, however, the management must “act decisively in the interest of the remaining jobs”. Only “with a reduced level of production” could “secure a stable business development for the future”.
mg / dpa