‘The genie is out of the bottle’
The union members who work at VDL Nedcar in Born have unanimously rejected an offer from owner VDL for the severance payment. The factory will be on strike again at the beginning of next week.
At two massively attended member meetings on Thursday, the unions discussed an offer made by the VDL management last Monday. The employees of Nedcar consider this offer far below par. “We will prepare actions on Friday, so that we can go on strike early next week,” said the FNV spokesperson. “The genie is out of the bottle. There is a lot of emotion and anger among people here. People are losing jobs and happiness in life. That plays a huge role. The severance payment that VDL offers them is much too low.”
A few weeks ago there was also a wildcat strike that lasted two days, eventually followed by an organized four-day strike. After that, the parties agreed on new negotiations, which started on Monday. The result of this angered the employees of the factory. The unions want an improved social plan in the run-up to the expected mass layoffs, because the production contract with BMW expires early next year and no successor has yet been found.
VDL finds rejection ‘incomprehensible’
VDL disapproves of the strike, the company said in a response. “Staking does not help our employees and VDL Nedcar. Going on strike makes the future of VDL Nedcar very uncertain. We therefore consider it unwise to go on strike,” said a spokesman for the Eindhoven company. VDL refuses to give in to the pressure. “We find this ‘no’ incomprehensible. We have no intention whatsoever of adjusting our proposal. We have arranged a more than reasonable and decent social safety net for everyone, more than twice the legal amount. We also benefit from that social plan added another personal bonus (of €7,500), which we called Finish With Pride, provided we properly produce all the cars we agreed with BMW.”
– Thanks for information from Autoweek.nl