Workers launched rolling two-hour strikes Monday at nine Volkswagen car and component plants across Germany to underscore their resistance to pay cuts and factory closures, which the company says are necessary to cope with a slack European auto market.
The work stoppages included the company's base plant at Wolfsburg, where workers rallied against a cost-cutting drive by the automaker’s management in which they face the threat of the company’s first plant closures in its home country.
Volkswagen argues that it must lower costs in Germany to levels achieved by competitors and by Volkswagen plants in Eastern Europe and South America.
At Volkswagen's main plant in Wolfsburg alone, a two-hour strike means several hundred cars, including the iconic Golf, cannot be built, union sources said.
Chief employee representative Daniela Cavallo has said employees should not shoulder the burden of management failures to develop attractive products and come up with a cheaper, entry-level electric vehicle.
"We demand that all make their contribution – management and the shareholder side as well,” Cavallo said at the rally in Wolfsburg as employees drummed, whistled and clapped.
She said the next round of talks in a week’s time "is likely to set the course – rapprochement or escalation. We are ready for both.”
The so-called warning strikes, a common tactic in German wage negotiations, are taking place as part of talks for a new labor agreement after a mandatory peace period that bars strikes expired on Sunday. The IG Metall industrial union said any job actions beyond those occurring on Monday would be announced later.
The union last week proposed measures it said would save 1.5 billion euros ($1.6 billion), including forgoing bonuses for 2025 and 2026, which Europe's biggest carmaker dismissed.
The company is demanding a 10% pay cut for 120,000 German workers and has said it can't avoid shedding factory capacity that is no longer needed. Employee representatives say the company has proposed closing three of its German plants.
A Volkswagen spokesperson said the carmaker respected the workers' right to strike and had taken steps to ensure a basic level of supplies to customers and minimize the strike's impact.
Thorsten Groger, the regional leader of the IG Metall industrial union in Lower Saxony, where Volkswagen is headquartered, said that the company won’t be able to "overlook” the walkouts. "If necessary, this will be one of the toughest conflicts Volkswagen has ever seen.”
"How long and how intensive this confrontation needs to be is Volkswagen's responsibility at the negotiating table," Groeger said.
The company hasn't publicly detailed its plans but is facing a drop in demand in Europe, higher costs and increasing competition from Chinese automakers.
Volkswagen built factories to supply a European car market of 16 million in annual vehicle sales, but now faces demand for around 14 million, Volkswagen brand head Thomas Schaefer was quoted as saying in the Welt am Sonntag newspaper. Since Volkswagen has a quarter of the market, that represents a loss of 500,000 cars a year.
For years, strong profits in China helped cover higher costs, but the changing environment now means that "it's high time to address this,” Schaefer said.
The walkouts began at a plant in Zwickau in eastern Germany and were to continue at plants in Braunschweig, Chemnitz, Dresden, Emden, Hanover, Kassel, and Salzgitter.
The next negotiations are slated for Dec. 9.
"Management wants to drive the nail in even further," said Lucia Heim, a worker at VW's Hanover plant taking part in Monday's strike.
"It's a twisted world: in football, trainers quit if they’re not winning the game. At VW, it's the other way around. Players are being punished."
