No banners or pickets. Calm seems to reign, on this morning of Tuesday October 10, within the factory of the automobile equipment manufacturer Marelli, installed since 1970 in Argentan, on the edge of the sub-prefecture of Orne, in the north of the rural areas of the Normandy departments. Throttle bodies are produced there: small boxes supplying air to the gasoline engines of several car brands.
However, appearances are deceptive, because excitement and disgust have dominated among the 167 employees since the announcement, Wednesday October 4, of the launch of a job protection plan (PSE). After a three-day walkout, they returned to work. This social plan, the first outlines of which will take shape during an extraordinary social and economic committee, Thursday October 12, “will take three months”, according to the inter-union CGT, CFE-CGC and CFDT. It should result in the closure of the factory at the beginning of 2024 and the dismissal of the entire workforce.
Another French Marelli site is targeted by a PSE and an upcoming closure: the Saint-Julien-du-Sault factory (Yonne), which manufactures vehicle rear lights. There, 125 positions are at stake, and the strike action launched the week of October 2 continues.
“Significant operating loss”
“After several months of lies and deception on the part of the group’s management, this announcement is only the conclusion of a relocation process decided and initiated for several months”deplores the inter-union of the Normandy factory, which affirms that a transfer to Slovakia, to another factory of the group, has already been recorded. “We have the proof: production lines identical to ours have been created there”assures Jean-Philippe Fresny, CGT union delegate. “At this stage, it is a project »Marelli management notes in writing, specifying that its other French sites (Châtellerault, Strasbourg and Trappes) are not threatened.
To understand the will of the Italian-Japanese Marelli group (fifty thousand employees worldwide), owned, since its purchase in 2018 from Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, by the powerful American investment and pension fund KKR, we must refer to its recent Press Releases.
In Argentan, “between 2018 and 2022, the site generated a cumulative loss of more than 28 million euros. The factory will face a significant drop in orders in 2024 and forecasts for the following years are also down sharply”. On the Saint-Julien-du-Sault side, “during the last two years, the factory has only worked at 30% of its capacity” And “reported a significant operating loss of more than 24 million euros between 2018 and 2022”.
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