Caoa Chery maintains layoff of 485 employees and offers up to 15 bonus salaries

With the decision of the Caoa Chery group to fire 485 employees and keep the factory in Jacareí (SP) closed for three years, workers at the unit continue to carry out protests to try to reverse the measure.

Last Wednesday (18), a group of them demonstrated in front of the Legislative Assembly of São Paulo (Alesp), where a public hearing was taking place to discuss deindustrialization in the state.

The Metalworkers Union of São José dos Campos e Região announced last week that the company had agreed to carry out a lay-off program (temporary suspension of contracts) for five months and grant another three of stability, but then would have gone back and kept the cuts.

In a note, Caoa Chery informed that it did not accept the suspension of contracts, as the legislation establishes the measure when there is a forecast of resumption of production in the short term, which is not its case.

According to the group, the intention is to keep the unit closed until 2025, during which time the factory will be prepared to produce only hybrid and electric models.

In all, the Jacareí plant employs 627 employees and only those in the administrative areas will be maintained.

For those who will be laid off, the company offers additional severance pay – there will be 15 salaries for those who have been with the company for more than five years, ten for those with two to five years and seven for those with up to two years of contract.

In all proposals, the salary cap is BRL 5,000, that is, those who have worked for more than five years would receive an additional BRL 75,000.

Without commitment

The union president, Weller Gonçalves, insists that the company backtracked and said he feared that the factory would not resume operations in three years, as announced, as there is no formal commitment made by the company.

According to the trade unionist, at the hearing on Wednesday, deputy Carlos Giannazi (PSOL) said he will ask the São Paulo Court of Auditors for access to information on tax exemptions given to companies that intend to leave the region.

“The purpose is to find out how much these companies have benefited from public money”, said Gonçalves.

He also informed that the Permanent Commission of Labor Relations will also be activated so that the owners of Caoa Chery and other companies are summoned to provide clarifications to Alesp.

Next Friday, there will be an online conciliation hearing between the union, Caoa and the Public Ministry of Labor in the Jacareí region.

In the assessment of Bright Consulting partner, Cássio Pagliarini, an automaker does not normally need three years to adapt its production line, not even for totally new models, such as electric and hybrids.

Pagliarini also said that, in cases where the company imports most of the components — as with Caoa Chery — the average time for the transition would be one year.

“The period of three years is usually what it takes to develop a vehicle, make tools for production and prepare the assembly line”, says the consultant.

production stopped

The Jacareí factory has been idle since March, when production line employees took paid leave. The plant produced the models Tiggo 3 — which was discontinued — and Arrizo 6, which will be imported from China.

The unit opened in 2015 has the capacity to produce, in one shift, 50,000 vehicles a year, but the maximum reached so far was 14,000 units last year.

In the beginning, the factory belonged entirely to the Chinese group Chery. Then, half of the shares were sold to the Brazilian company Caoa, which also has a factory in Anápolis (GO), where the production of Chery and Hyundai models will be maintained.

The group was created by Brazilian businessman Carlos Alberto de Oliveira Andrade, who died in August of last year, aged 77.

Strike at Renault

Renault employees in São José dos Pinhais (PR) enter today the 13th day of strike because of the value of the Profit Sharing Program (PPR).

On Wednesday afternoon, a new meeting was scheduled with representatives of the company and a possible proposal will be presented at a meeting scheduled for this afternoon.

At the beginning of the week, the Metalworkers Union of Greater Curitiba proposed the payment of at least R$ 22.3 thousand in PPR to each employee.

Renault said it would agree to the figure as long as it was linked to the production target of 198,500 vehicles this year.

The union, however, does not accept the condition, claiming, for example, that the difficulty in importing semiconductors – which has led several factories to interrupt production – may hinder the achievement of the goal.

In the complex, models Kwid, Sandero, Logan, Stepway, Duster, Captur, Oroch, Master and engines are made. The information is from the newspaper. The State of São Paulo.