2024-09-07 09:39:33
While Volkswagen is in crisis, the company’s top managers are holding a meeting in Sweden. The works council and IG Metall are sharply criticizing the board.
Since Volkswagen recently announced that job security will be terminated until 2029 and that plant closures in Germany can no longer be ruled out, many employees are worried about their future.
Against this background, a meeting of VW top managers is now attracting criticism. A three-day conference of the Group and brand management with the company’s top management has been taking place since Thursday. The venue is the “Artipelag”, an art museum and hotel on an archipelago island off Stockholm.
“The meeting of the top management and the board of directors in Sweden cannot be explained to our workforce. And especially not since the events of Monday this week,” criticized a spokesperson for the group’s works council sharply. The works council is calling for a thorough review of such events. “The principle of ‘Stöcken instead of Stockholm’ would certainly suit the group better,” added the spokesperson.
IG Metall Wolfsburg also voiced clear criticism and spoke of a “luxury trip” by top management. The union reported that the art exhibition “I follow the sun” was closed to the “art-loving foot soldiers” for the meeting. In fact, according to the website, the Artipelag is closed for the duration of the meeting.
According to IG Metall, most of the participants will stay at the “Radisson Blue Waterfront”. The union calls the hotel a “temple”. “Nothing is known yet about the millions of euros that this top management school trip will cost. The bill certainly does not come close to the cost of the cuts planned by the board, which does not shy away from closing VW factories and issuing redundancies when there are problems with profitability,” the union continued.
When asked, Volkswagen confirmed the meeting in Sweden. A spokesperson explained that it was a business and strategy meeting of the global top management of all brands and companies, which takes place once a year at a location of one of the group brands.
This year, the home country of the truck subsidiary Scania was chosen as the venue. “The meetings are important, especially in difficult times, in order to gain a common view of the challenges and opportunities,” said the spokesman. CEO Oliver Blume provided insights into the new corporate strategy, and topics such as financial figures, new technologies and business models were on the agenda.
IG Metall Wolfsburg concluded by commenting that the topic of virtual reality would also be discussed at the meeting. “One might ask, however, whether some of those involved, after this week’s news, actually need to arrive in the real world before they start thinking about the virtual world of tomorrow,” the union concluded.