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(Brussels, 6 September 2016) IndustriAll Europe expresses its full solidarity with the workers at Caterpillar, subcontractors and their families following the dramatic events of Friday 2nd September.
Caterpillar’s restructuring plans include the closure of its sites in Monkstown (Northern Ireland) and Gosselies (Belgium), affecting 250 employees and 2,200 employees respectively. Thousands of workers employed both directly and indirectly by the company will therefore be affected, throughout the European supply chain. Once more, industriAll Europe condemns this industrial, economic and social disaster at European level. Despite the tremendous efforts made during 2013 by Caterpillar workers at Gosselies, including their willingness to accept more flexible working practices and reduced bonuses, this was still not enough to satisfy the appetites of the US company’s shareholders for ever-greater profits. Notwithstanding the financial aid that the company received from the regional authorities, Caterpillar’s management has taken the decision to wipe the site at Gosselies off the map, thus putting an end to 50 years of cooperation with the region of Charleroi.
“It is quite simply unacceptable. The management of this multinational needs to be accountable to its workers and to the regions that the company has been based in for the last 50 years,” declared Luc Triangle and Benoît Gérits, respectively General and Deputy General Secretaries of industriAll Europe. “We will ensure that the company respects its duties with regards to information and consultation of workers, both at national and European level”, they added.
The excessive financialisation of the economy is leading to the closure of production plants on European soil, across all sectors. It is high time that this economic governance, which always follows the same pattern - namely the introduction of flexible working practices to the detriment of the workers and moreover a soft line on taxation of multinationals - be revised. It is becoming a matter of urgency for industry that a true public investment plan be put forward as part of a redefinition of the roles of the ECB and EIB.
This new social tragedy, which highlights the unscrupulous behaviour of a multinational, reignites the debate on the need for European policies which foster sustainable and socially-responsible economic development and which eradicate all forms of social and fiscal dumping.
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