No Forced Redundancies at Opel

The drastic cost-saving and restructuring program being implemented at struggling German car maker Opel will not entail any compulsory redundancies or plant closures, executives of US parent company General Motors and unions announced on Wednesday. After weeks of negotiations, management and employee representatives had agreed that the 10,000 jobs being cut in Germany as part of a wider €500 million ($668 million) cost-cutting drive would be implemented without forced redundancies, said the head of GM’s European general works council, Klaus Franz. “Our common goal is to ensure that the restructuring and cost-cutting measures are socially acceptable and guarantee fair conditions for production capacities in the future,” he told reporters. (AFP)