The iconic MINI Cooper
It is quite true that an economic recession hurts. Company after company has laid off millions of workers worldwide over the last 12 months. While one can discuss blame all day long, part of the problem is that consumers and lenders have over-extended themselves. Virtually every company, especially automakers, has seen drastic reductions in expenditures.
The numbers for UK-produced automobiles are dramatic, to say the least.
A total of 61,404 new cars were produced in January 2009, 58.7% lower than January 2008, as plants closed for extended winter shutdowns, according to the Society of Motor Manufacturers and Traders (SMMT).
Aston Martin: Extended Christmas shutdown and 600 redundancies. Three-day week
Bentley: Three-day week in October and longer Christmas break. The company is closing its Crewe plant for seven weeks from March. February announced 220 job losses and 10% pay cut.
GM (Vauxhall): Extended Christmas closure and 40-day shutdown
Honda: Four-month shutdown between February and May
Jaguar Land Rover: Series of one-day shutdowns and production cuts late 2008 plus 1,000 redundancies planned
Mini: Christmas shutdown was extended by 10 days. 300 agency staff let go and with a one-week shutdown planned for February. From March, plant will run five days per week, from seven, and a further 850 jobs to go.
Ford: 850 jobs to go by May
One of the difficulties that manufacturers have is that they constantly struggle to gauge demand of vehicles. Since the rise of U.S. gas prices to $4/gallon a year ago, the automakers had to make a switch to smaller/lighter less-gas guzzling vehicles such was the case at GM. GM is still paying for the ineptitude in their failing to have these smaller cars ready to be sold when demand took hold. The result of the rising cost of gas was that MINI found itself well positioned to offer good quality, fuel-efficient passenger cars. In the moment, they seemed brilliant strategists. And one day, they may again come off as brilliant will the gas prices in the U.S. rise – it is only a matter of time.
In the meantime, the world struggles with a major credit crisis, evolving into a major jobless crisis. Combined, these two factors have meant a major slowdown for all manufacturers, even those who produce fuel-efficient cars. Toyota has seen a major slowdown, even for the once-prized Prius, and MINI, as seen from the above information, is now facing rough times. Does the company deserve it?
According to BMW Group, BMW sales fell by 4.3% in 2008, to 1.4 million vehicles, although Mini sales actually rose by 4.3% last year, to 232,425 cars.
The end result is that hard-working employees have been let go, despite their successes. In a capitalist system where people are supposed to be rewarded for their work, one can understand the employees’ fury behind the BMW/MINI
Reports the BBC:
Russell Hager told the BBC he had seen the sackings coming, but was still shocked at how the situation had been handled.
“It’s the unfairness of the way people are treated in large corporations such as BMW,” he said. “Why is it allowed to happen that people like myself go to work, give the company fairness, loyalty, commitment, and try to build a better life for [themselves], then half an hour later they can just be told, ‘You haven’t got a job any more’?”
Tony Woodley, joint secretary of the Unite union, said the sacking of the Mini workers was a “national disgrace” and agency staff were being treated as “second class citizens”.
“This kind of action would be illegal in Germany,” Mr Woodley said.
“BMW is guilty of blatant opportunism by sacking workers on the cheap. It has got to be stopped.
“These aren’t just temporary workers – these are workers like you and I who have got families and commitments.
“They’ve been loyal, decent, dedicated and they get called in with an hour’s notice to say that after four or five years they are going to be cast aside like cannon fodder.
“It can’t be right.”
Silvia Fernandes worked at the plant for four years; she says she feels betrayed by the suddenness of the news.
She told the BBC: “In this meeting they told us we’d all been sacked because of the credit crunch. But actually we already knew some of us would have to go, that was a fact of course because of the crisis – but what we never expected from BMW was knowing one hour before [our shift].
“I’ve never been sick, I’ve never missed work and they tell me one hour before that I’ve been sacked. That’s not on. That’s why people are angry and so upset with BMW and with the union.”
John Cunningham worked at the factory for over two years. He says he does not yet know what he will do next.
Mr Cunningham told the BBC: “I feel betrayed, they’ve planned this for months and we’ve only just been told – one hour’s notice. We’ve been given a week’s pay for an enforced week off which I suppose is a week’s notice.
“If I have to sign on to benefits that makes that increasingly difficult so I’m not sure what I’m going to do yet.”
Yes, it is true that times are tough, but there will come a day when the global recession
True, we should not expect automakers to be rewarded for bad practices. We should not expect the banks to be rewarded either. But everyone must understand that when companies are success, when employees do a commendable job, that the executives at companies make decisions that positively impact their people and their clients, not negatively impact them.
BMW and the dozens of other automakers around the world facing similar problems need to have open and frank discussions about organizational issues. They must prioritize long-term strategic planning over short-term bottom-lines. Transparency and communication must be valued. Companies that intend to bring back workers should let them know when they will be back, and those that fire them permanently should provide them monetary and job training assistance so that they may rejoin the workforce.
We are, after all, in this one together.
Sources: SMMT/ BBC Archives
