SENIOR union officials are in Merseyside today to resolve an unofficial walk-out by car workers at Halewood’s Getrag Ford plant.
They staged their lightning action on Tuesday in protest over plans to axe at least one of three shifts at the transmission plant and switch the work to a sister site in Bordeaux.
About 650 staff work at the site, which is a 50-50 joint venture between German transmissions maker Getrag and the Ford group.
It produces gearboxes for Ford Transit vehicles and Fiestas, and is situated next to the Jaguar Land Rover plant, but has no links.
Workers were told of the company’s plans to switch work on the Fiesta gearbox line late last month.
Unite the Union senior auto industry negotiator Dave Osborne was due to meet with shop stewards last week, but the talks were postponed.
He confirmed he will meet with plant union representatives today.
A Getrag Ford spokeswoman said: “We are in discussion about the reduction of the current shift pattern because of this extreme fall in demand and the need to align costs to the production volume.”
