Airbus Unions Say 40,000 Workers Strike Over Job Cuts
By Andrea Rothman and Brian Parkin
March 16 (Bloomberg) -- Airbus SAS labor unions said 40,000 workers in western Europe staged strikes against job cuts today, disrupting production for the third time in two months at the world's largest maker of commercial aircraft.
About 22,000 employees in Germany, 11,000 in France, and 7,000 in Spain stopped work in locally organized protests against Toulouse, France-based Airbus's Power8 spending-reduction program, according to union leaders in the three countries.
Airbus plans to eliminate 10,000 jobs and will sell or find partners for six plants in a reorganization targeting 2.1 billion euros ($2.8 billion) in annual savings as of 2010. Walkouts could threaten Airbus's goal of providing customers with a record 444 to 450 planes in 2007. Chief Executive Officer Louis Gallois said March 9 that deliveries would be ``vulnerable'' to strikes.
``We're sending a clear signal that we don't accept the plan,'' Daniel Friedrich, a spokesman for the IG Metall union in Germany, said in a telephone interview, adding that unions are ``at the beginning of this dispute.''
A rally in downtown Hamburg drew more than 20,000 people from plants across Germany, Jean Francois Knepper, president of Airbus's European works council, said in a phone interview. A Toulouse protest rally had ``a terrific turnout'' totaling 7,000 protesters, including more than 200 IG Metall members coming from Germany, Knepper said.
`Battling' Cutbacks
``We're not negotiating, we're battling for the end of Power8,'' said Jean-Jacques Desvignes, an organizer of today's demonstrations and a coordinator between France's CGT union and the metalworker's union. ``We're against the planned measures, we're against sale of the sites, against sending jobs elsewhere, and against cutting 10,000 jobs,'' he said.
An additional 4,000 workers protested in the French towns of St. Nazaire and Meaulte, according to the Brussels-based European Metalworker's union, which organized protests in the countries where Airbus has its main sites. The planemaker wants to sell the Saint Nazaire plant and find an investment partner in Meaulte.
About 200 French employees traveled to Paris to demonstrate outside the headquarters of European Aeronautic, Defence & Space Co., Airbus's owner, Desvignes said.
In Laupheim, Germany, 2,000 people formed a human chain and paraded in front of factory gates carrying red wooden hearts, the union said. Airbus plans to sell the Laupheim plant.
Employees in Spain held a one-hour midday work stoppage, the Confederacion Sindical de Comisiones Obreras and Union General de Trabajadores, Spain's largest trade unions, said in a joint statement.
`Long Struggle'
Unions are ``preparing for a long struggle,'' Jutta Blankau, leader of the IG Metall's coastal chapter, said in an interview with Germany's ZDF television channel this morning. The union has sent a five-page question catalogue to management demanding ``clarity'' on aspects of Power8 as its heard nothing on the plan from executives since Feb. 28, the day the plan was unveiled.
Airbus is scaling back spending because of losses stemming from a two-year delay getting the 555-seat A380 airliner into service and the extra cost of redesigning the planned 250- to 350-seat A350 model. The first A380 is scheduled to be delivered at the end of this year, while the A350 is slated to begin service in 2013.
Earlier Strikes
The planemaker's French workers staged a walkout March 6. Production employees in Germany held a strike Feb. 2 at four of Airbus's seven factories in the country. The reorganization plan, which would lead to Airbus cutting its workforce by 18 percent, has become an issue in France's presidential election campaign.
The French government owns 15 percent of EADS while Paris- based Lagardere SCA, France's biggest publishing company, owns 7.5 percent and votes the government's shares. Stuttgart, Germany-based DaimlerChrysler AG, the world's fifth-biggest carmaker, owns 15 percent of EADS shares and controls voting rights for 22.5 percent.
Following a meeting with Airbus's works council March 14, CEO Gallois said in a statement that the discussions are ``on- going.'' He made no reference to the planned labor protests and Barbara Kracht, a spokeswoman at Airbus in Toulouse, said the company had no further comment today.
Shares of EADS in Paris rose 25 euro cents, or 1.2 percent, to 22 euros. The stock is down 16 percent this year, valuing EADS at 18 billion euros.
