A bargaining table of IG Metall stands at the entrance from the Neue Halberg-Guss to Leipzig.
Photo: dpa / Hendrik Schmidt
19659004] In the labor dispute with auto parts supplier Neue Halberg casting (NHG) in Saarbrücken and Leipzig are now apparently in negotiations after weeks of hardening fronts. The management and IG Metall want to negotiate this Thursday in Frankfurt-on-Main on the social wage agreement demanded by the union. "We are waiting for a negotiable offer," said the first plenipotentiary of IG Metall of Saarbrücken, Hans Peter Kurtz
Since mid-June, more than 2,200 employees in Leipzig and Saarbrücken have been on a perpetual strike. The trigger is the complete closure project of the Leipzig plant by the end of 2019. Crankshafts, cylinder heads and housings were produced here for Volkswagen. After the break, 750 employees were on the street. The future of the Saarbrücken-based parent plant with about 1,500 employees is also uncertain.
The vast majority of NHG workers are organized in IG Metall and have demonstrated strength and cohesion for weeks. They demand the preservation of all jobs. At a poll in Leipzig (over 98%) and in Saarbrücken, almost 94% of trade unionists surveyed declared themselves by striking. The official goal of the strike is a social wage agreement to cushion the consequences of a loss of employment. Key points are the creation of a qualifying company and trust fund funded by the NHG, which is supposed to pay employees severance pay or subsidies to place them in a new position
. The actors of the car manufacturers concerned IG Metall had not followed. He insisted on formal collective bargaining. The Arslan movement indicates that the strike has an effect. According to recent reports, Eisenach Opelwerk has already received priority at the start of the company holidays due to bottlenecks in the offer. According to insider information, the farm machinery manufacturer Deutz-Fahr will soon be "critical".
After more than three weeks of collective action, the strikers are determined. "The striking front is open 24 hours a day, nothing works in the factory," confirmed Kurtz on request. "Halberg Guss has to live," he says on a factory banner in the industrial suburb of Brebach. In the city of Saarbrücken, a procession of strikers caused a sensation Wednesday with 400 cars and 60 motorcycles. Many pbaders-by expressed their solidarity. On Thursday, trade unionists from the Kaiserslautern, Baunatal and Kbadel automobile factories visited the strikers in Saarbrücken. The Landtag in Saarbrücken has unanimously expressed its support for the preservation of work. In Leipzig, Mayor Burkhard Jung (SPD) visited the strikers. Those who do not personally go to Saarbrücken or Leipzig can support an online petition.
NHG has a secular tradition as a foundry in Saarland. Halberg built the metal casting plant built in the GDR in the district of Böhlitz-Ehrenberg in 1993 by the former Treuhandanstalt. The company filed for bankruptcy in 2009 as a result of the global economic crisis. This has been followed by a number of changes in ownership and wage sacrifices by the workforce. In early 2018, NHG was acquired by the Prevent Group, owned by the Bosnian Hastor entrepreneurial family. Since the 1990s, it has acquired a large number of automobile distribution companies. Trade unionists certify Prevent as a clbadic "cricket". Thus, since 2016, the company is mbadively pushing Lieferboykott 's main customers like VW to face huge price increases. The high profits would then be erased by Prevent. IG Metall
Martin Dulig (SPD), Minister of the Economy of Saxony, spoke during a detour to Leipzig of the "pure predatory capitalism" of the Prevent group. His harsh criticisms have a fertile breeding ground. Because since 2016, a boycott of deliveries and the fierce conflict with VW to provide conditions for two subsidiaries of Saxon Prevent have fallen into disarray: the car seat manufacturer Car Trim and the supplier of ES cast gearboxes. Here is a total of 1,300 jobs at risk, after VW has apparently found other suppliers. Such scenarios want to prevent NHG employees in time. "We will do everything possible to avoid being crushed in a power game between two big players," said Bernd Geier, chairman of the Saarbrücker company committee.
In the longer term, trade unionists and political actors do not see a future. Sake-Minister of Economic Affairs Anke Rehlinger (SPD) suggested selling to another investor. "We have come to stay," says Arslan.