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ECONOMY

Opel to stop Astra production in Germany

Production of Opel's key Astra model is to cease at the struggling German carmaker's Rüsselsheim plant, a newspaper reported on Sunday - in favour of cheaper labour in Poland and the UK.

Opel to stop Astra production in Germany
Photo: DPA

According to the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, the drastic decision by Opel’s US parent company General Motors is meant to reverse a long sequence of losses. But workers say it could jeopardise the future of Opel’s parent plant.

The Astra hatchback is, along with the Corsa, Opel’s most important model, with an annual production volume of around 330,000.

If plans to remove it from Rüsselsheim go ahead, one unionist said it would be comparable to stopping production of the Golf at a Volkswagen factory.

According to the proposals, from 2015 the Astra would only roll off the production line at Ellesmere Port in England and Gliwice in Poland. The mid-range Insignia saloon would become the sole model produced at Rüsselsheim.

The FAZ says the decision will not be officially announced until mid-May, and a company spokesman told the paper there would be no comment until the conclusion of “ongoing talks.” But behind the scenes unionists say that GM vice president Stephen Girsky, president of the Opel board of directors, has made up his mind.

For GM and the Opel management under Karl-Freidrich Stracke, the move is a desperate measure to cut costs.

Since 1999, Opel has cost its parent company $16 billion. The European arm of the US giant, recently described by the GM chief Daniel Akerson as a “building site,” is this year set to notch up its sixth consecutive loss.

It is against this backdrop that GM has decided to refocus operations to the UK and Poland, where the workers are cheaper and more flexible.

Their willingness to work 40-hour weeks and up to 80 Saturday overtime shifts a year should allow for the production of an extra 115,000 units a year, according to projections.

But workers at the Rüsselsheim factory insist they can be part of a coherent cost-cutting strategy.

Their works council, led by Wolfgang Schäfer-Klug, has tabled a last-ditch counterproposal to Girsky, offering to finance the investment that would be needed to produce the new Astras at their plant through pay cuts and other money-saving measures.

It’s not the first time that German Opel workers have been left fearing for their future. In the past three years, GM has slashed 8,000 of its 48,000 European jobs, and in June last year, rumours that the company was to be sold to a Chinese bidder prompted Angela Merkel to call for clarity for Opel’s “hard-working” employees.

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TRANSPORT

Copenhagen Metro lines reopen after two-week closure

Lines M3 and M4 of the Copenhagen Metro are back in service having reopened on Sunday, one day ahead of schedule.

Copenhagen Metro lines reopen after two-week closure

The two lines had been closed so that the Metro can run test operations before opening five new stations on the M4 line this summer.

The tests, which began on February 10th, are now done and the lines were running again as of Sunday evening, a day ahead of the original planned reopening on Monday February 26th.

“We are very pleased to be able to welcome our passengers on to our two lines M3 and M4,” head of operations with the Metro Søren Boysen said.

“The whole test procedure exceeded all expectations and went faster than expected and we can therefore get a head start on our reopening now,” he said.

Time set aside for potential repeat tests was not needed in the event, allowing the test closures to be completed ahead of time.

“Several of our many tests went better than expected and we have therefore not used all the time we needed for extra tests,” Boysen said.

The two lines serve around one million passengers every week, according to the Metro company.

READ ALSO: Copenhagen city government greenlights extension to Metro line

The new stops on the M4 line will be located south of central Copenhagen in the Valby and Sydhavn areas. The will have the names Haveholmen, Enghave Brygge, Sluseholmen, Mozarts Plads and København Syd (Copenhagen South).

The M3 and M4 lines, the newer sections of the Metro, opened in 2019 and 2020 respectively.

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