Opel to cut more than 8,000 jobs, still needs €3.3 billion

The Opel restructuring plan is pretty much finished, with around 8,300 jobs set to be cut, according to Nick Reilly, new chairman of General Motors Europe, who talked about it in a telephone conference on Saturday.

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The capacity of Opel and its British counterpart Vauxhall will be reduced, he confirmed, leading to the job cuts. Reilly said he saw the restructuring as his primary task, although the damage to Opel’s image must also be repaired.

The future of the company lies with a greater range of cars, he suggested and although he did not go into detail, it is known he wants to produce a small car to fit below the Corsa models. Small vans must also enter the equation, he said.

Immediate finance concerns were being tackled with negotiations over state help for the company, he said, and although more time was needed for everything to be agreed, things were moving in the right direction.

The most important thing was to ensure nothing that was undertaken broke European Union competition laws. He said Opel/Vauxhall still needed €3.3 billion, of which €1 billion was necessary for the restructuring process.

General Motors itself will invest €600 million but the Reilly said the rest must come from the governments of those European countries where the company produces cars.