General Motors meets workers’ resistance

GENERAL MOTORS is in trouble – and not just economically. With his
recently announced plan to close down the factory in Azambuja, Portugal
and to move the production of the Opel Combo to Zaragossa in Spain,
GM-Europe executive Carl-Peter Foster has provoked workers’ resistance
in all of the company’s European plants.

Daniel Behruzi, SAV (CWI Germany)

Production of the Opel-Astra and Zafira in the German factories of
Bochum and Eisenach was stopped for several hours recently because of a
workers’ rally in solidarity with their 1,150 Portugese colleagues,
threatened by the closure.

Last week, 5,000 employees attended a demonstration in the company’s
main plant in RŸsselsheim, Hessia. Similar actions have taken place in
all 18 of GM’s European plants.

GM workers feel threatened by the company’s newest cuts-package,
which is said to be worth E130 million.

The current "re-structuring" programme has led to wage cuts and the
loss of 6,500 jobs in the German Opel plants alone.

This has been carried out with the consent of the leadership of the
IG Metall union and the workers’ council, Betriebsrat. But the closure
of the factory in Azambuja has shown that GM managers want more.

The factories in Bochum, Antwerp (Belgium), TrollhŠttan (Sweden),
Gleiwitz (Poland) and Ellesmere Port are supposed to compete for the
production of the new Astra from 2010. Two of them might be closed then.

In Ellesmere Port, 900 jobs have already been cut recently.
Altogether, 30,000 jobs at GM Europe are threatened.

The situation in the United States – the home country of the world’s
biggest car manufacturer – is no better. Twelve factories will be shut
down in the next two years. 30,000 workers are supposed to leave the
company. 25,000 have already taken a golden handshake and left
‘voluntarily’.

But the workers in the European factories definitely do not want to
give in to the management’s plans without a fight.

The closure of Azambuja would be: "the beginning of the end of the
production of motor vehicles in Western Europe", says the leader of the
euro-workers’ council, Klaus Franz. "We are preparing for a long
conflict", he adds.

Nevertheless, it is more than doubtful whether the workers’ council
and trade union leaders will wage an effective struggle against the
company’s plans. They are very much tied to "social partnership" and
think of themselves as better co-managers.

Franz especially has a long history of stabbing struggling workers in
the back. In 2003, during the bitter East German metal workers’ strike
for the 35-hour week, he publicly spoke out against the dispute.

And when the Opel workers in Bochum went on a week-long ‘wildcat’
strike in October 2004, he did everything he could to put an end to the
stoppage.

Because of this experience, there is a lot of scepticism among the
activists in Bochum. "The workers are distrustful of the leaders of the
trade union and the workers’ council", reports JŸrgen Schwartz from the
oppositional group Gegenwehr ohne Grenzen (Resistance without Borders).
"But nevertheless, the protests, which are now taking place, are a step
in the right direction".

He suggests that as the next move, the workers should deliver an
ultimatum to the management. If they don’t take back their plans to
close down Azambuja, strike action on a larger scale should be
organised.