industriAll Europe sounds the alarm on the automotive industry crisis

Meeting in Porto on 28-29 November 2024, industriAll Europe’s Executive Committee responded to the crisis by setting out its position as “Workers of the automotive industry and its supply chain’s wake up call for Europe”. The aim of this document is to send clear signals to the new European Commission at the start of its mandate: the automotive industry is in crisis and Europe needs to respond quickly. 

This action should include measures to ensure fair international competition, a strengthened Just Transition framework, and a European Industrial plan for affordable sustainable mobility.

This autumn, the automotive industry has been faced with a series of brutal layoff announcements. It has brought social anxiety, as well as dramatic losses of skills and manufacturing capacities. It also undermines key political objectives of the EU such as open strategic autonomy and just transition. While the turbulent geopolitical context shows the danger of losing domestic manufacturing facilities daily, populist forces are using the social insecurity created to erode the foundations of our democracies. It’s time to stem the bleed and bring stability to the situation. This demands concrete political actions.

We need negotiated plans with genuine efforts to look for alternatives to layoffs and, where necessary, to put in place a moratorium on forced redundancies.

After her re-election last week as president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen announced that she will personally lead a new initiative to help Europe’s automotive industry steer through “a deep and disruptive transition” that already has thousands of jobs on the line.

In light of this, industriAll Europe urges the European Commission, to bring to the table, in the first 100 days the urgently needed assertive industrial strategy for the automotive sector and its supply chain. An industry that has a structural importance for wider European prosperity. 

We need a proactive industrial plan that tackles all the challenges the industry is struggling with, notably the roll out of charging infrastructures and a trade policy that strikes the right balance between anti- dumping measures and fair trade based on negotiated solutions avoiding trade wars.
With 13 million jobs dependent on the automotive sector, our members are watching closely how the Commission will respond to our demands. 

Trade unions will continue to mobilise their members in the coming weeks to ensure that our voices are heard by national and European leaders.

Read the Adopted Position paper – Workers of the automotive industry and its supply chain’s wake up call for Europe – EN  FR  DE