In May 2004, the Japanese-based Panasonic group announced the forthcoming closure of its MAES vacuum cleaner plant in Spain, with the loss of over 200 jobs, and the relocation of production to China. The company is offering a package of re-employment assistance and redundancy payments to the MAES workforce.
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In May 2004, the Japanese-based Panasonic group announced the forthcoming closure of its MAES vacuum cleaner plant in Spain, with the loss of over 200 jobs, and the relocation of production to China. The company is offering a package of re-employment assistance and redundancy payments to the MAES workforce.
On 21 May 2004, the Japanese-based electrical goods group, Panasonic, announced that it was to discontinue operations at its Spanish subsidiary Matsushita Electric España SA (MAES), which is responsible for production of vacuum cleaners for the European market, at the end of December 2004. The company cited an accumulated loss of over EUR 12 million over the past five years and a 34% fall across Europe in the prices of the vacuum cleaners produced by MAES. Panasonic is to move production to China, where costs are lower. The resulting closure of the MAES plant in Celrà, Girona will affect 216 workers.
Panasonic has thus become the latest example of a current wave of restructuring and relocation from Spain to Asian and eastern European countries, following in the footsteps of other multinationals such as Samsung and Philips (ES0402205F). Panasonic had made around 100 workers in Spain redundant in 2002 when it discontinued loudspeaker production, and the workforce fell from 463 workers in 1999 to 216 in 2003 as the group gradually moved production to facilities in China. The Girona factory could not compete on price, even though it made a net profit of EUR 1 million in 2001.
The Trade Union Confederation of Workers’ Commissions (Comisiones Obreras, CC.OO) has accused Panasonic of condemning the Girona factory to a 'slow death' and states that the workforce is highly skilled. The company will attempt to find new employment for the workforce, which is 80% female and has an average age of 40. It will provide compensation of more than 60 days' pay per year of service, according to the Catalan regional government's Minister of Labour and Industry, Josep María Rañé, after a meeting with the company. Mr Rañé will meet the City Council of Celrà, the County Council and the trade unions to launch a 'process of generation of alternative employment' in order to minimise the impact on the local population. The MAES workers will shortly decide whether to accept the redundancy terms offered by the company.
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