The global financial crisis is still nowhere near over and everyone throughout Gloucester and the rest of the UK are feeling the pinch. During this crisis it has in fact taken many victims including high street giants such as Woolworths, Peacocks, MFI and not excluding car manufacturers Saab.
Opel-Vauxhall has been stop starting throughout the past few years, struggling with a lower demand for new vehicles and a higher demand for hitting targets by the manufacturers. General Motors have recently announced that the current state of play could not go on and that it all needed to be sorted out. This extreme shake up led to speculation that job cuts were going to be on the cards for many employees, including some redundancies at its UK plant in Ellesmere.
A General Motors insider interviewed with the Wall Street Journal this week and implied that massive cuts will have to be made in order to bring Opel-Vauxhall back in full working order. According to the source the impending cuts that took place 2 years ago were not enough and more movement was needed in order to really make some serious changes for the companies future, and for the better.
Bosses at Opel-Vauxhall have been very quick to deny the rumours within local press and recently released a statement saying, “The management of the Opel management works council and supervisory board is all in agreement that it has to become profitable even in tough economic times. We’re discussing strategy and will keep employees and the public informed. We’re on a good path with an excellent product range and six new launches in 2012.”
If the Ellesmere Port were to be closed it would be a massive hit to the UK economy and unemployment rates would soon increase with in the area. Figures have shown that order numbers for left hand drive new Astra models at the Ellesmere plant have dropped significantly as a result of the Euro financial crisis. But the Ellesmere plant has been in the running to build the next generation Chevrolet Volt/Vauxhall Ampera.
