A year after the announcement of Opel’s purchase of General Motors by PSA, the French group’s management is negotiating with the works council of its new German subsidiary. Its goal is to reduce costs and bring the brand back to the brink. A risky gamble after years of accumulated deficit under the GM era.
Discussions with the powerful metalworking union IG Metall are tense. They concern both the application of Opel’s strategic plan and that of a sector wage agreement, providing for a 4.3% increase in wages in German metallurgy. Overview with Jorg Hoffman, its president.
How does cooperation with French unions work at Opel?
She’s just starting. Opel has major sites in Poland and Spain. It is already clear that PSA tries to make the industrial sites play against each other. We need a common approach from Opel and Vauxhall staff, but we have first contacts with PSA colleagues. We must certainly intensify them.
What is your relationship with PSA?
Mr. Tavares is a manager who works clearly on the basis of “benchmarks”, which also allow to detect weaknesses of Opel, but it is not done to go everywhere in force. The role of co-management and branch agreements in Germany, which are factors of sustainable development favorable to employee engagement, must nevertheless be explained to him. But with perseverance and a strong IG Metall, it works. Mr. Tavares is not an isolated case. This happens in many large groups that govern centrally from their headquarters abroad.
One would think that it would be better than with General Motors …
Yes and no. There are advantages and disadvantages. America was far away. The French are more involved. They are also more transparent and clear in the formulation of the subjects to be treated.
Daimler also has a new shareholder, with Geely. Are you still as open to Chinese investors?
We are cautious about the issue of technology transfer to China. We can only guard against danger by being two notches ahead of the competition for innovation. But we see the Chinese catching up a lot, for example in the machine tool. The other side of the coin is that Chinese capital is very patient: they are investing for the long term and the long term. So far, they interfere little in operational management. With one or two exceptions, they let the German management act freely. We can not complain about their treatment of co-management or the rights of employees.
Do you fear a trade war with the United States?
Trade barriers are still unfavorable for an exporting nation like Germany, but also for others. If you look at the auto sector, I’m a little relaxed, because the German manufacturers, thanks to their factories on the ground, are the largest exporters from the United States. The fact that the German industry has made a lot of foreign direct investment in recent years protects us a bit. But it remains a critical development for us.
What is the responsibility of the industry in the diesel crisis?
The auto industry has a responsibility where it cheated. But it’s different when the vehicles have fulfilled the registration requirements in force. In this case, they are technically compliant. In addition, there is compliance with nitrogen oxide emission standards because some city centers must react urgently to pollution peaks. In this respect, I am of the opinion that the problem can only be solved by the car industry.
The new branch agreement provides for the possibility of working 28 hours a week for two years. Is it a turning point?
Until the mid-1990s, IG Metall was very busy with the collective reduction of working hours to 35 hours a week. Then we tackled the reduction of working hours in favor of maintaining employment, for example with the 4-day week at Volkswagen. Flexibility then greatly helped us during the economic and financial crisis. We crossed it without dry layoffs and were able to enjoy the recovery afterwards. But we must not forget that the high flexibility of recent decades has benefited employers first. In this respect, the tariff agreement represents a break-up because, with the hours of work chosen, it is the employees and their interests that take precedence.
Do you think that many will choose to work 28 hours?
This is the key question and it is difficult to estimate. Our experience shows that the subject of working time has become extremely important, especially for young employees. They address the issue of balance between family and professional life in a totally different way than conventional skilled workers in the past.
You have conducted 24-hour strikes for the first time. Is there a revitalization of the social conflict in Germany?
I would not want to exaggerate. At the moment, we have a dynamic economy and a good job market, which has strengthened our negotiating position. And we are anyway a team that has confidence in her! But we created with this new instrument a possibility that was very important to us: a national social movement, homogeneous and gradual. In the past, we had to choose between walkouts and unlimited regional strikes.
Does the agreement help you recruit members?
It already helps massively! In the past two months alone, we have gained more than 10,000 members over last year. Thanks to the working time component, we managed to positively affect public opinion.
You also got increases of 4.3% for 2018 …
And more than 7% for the next 27 months. It’s more than in the past and it shows how good our industry is.
A new right wing union is trying to compete with IG Metall. Do you care?
Currently not. We need to monitor how these kinds of networks continue to anchor. But one must ask in a general way: how to address the reasons for the success of the extreme right? How can politics respond to employee fears and resolve the tension between the necessary change, on the one hand, and security, on the other, so that people do not fall back on themselves? Otherwise they follow the motto ‘no change, we close the doors’ (to foreigners). It is a challenge for us, but also for the government.