The employees of the Stellantis factory in Sochaux are once again seeing the word APLD appear in their daily lives: Partial Long-Term Activity or partial unemployment. In effect, just over 500 production workshop employees are affected. These employees will stay home all week because of the semiconductor crisis, which has slowed down site activity since February 18. From this Monday, they will therefore only receive 84% of their usual income. The unions contacted by France Bleu Belfort Montbéliard are worried about the future. “The weather is getting gloomy“ thus summarizes the CFDT.
Wage losses of 16%
The transition to partial unemployment will thus put in difficulty the employees concerned believes Jérôme Boussard of the CGT: “16% on a salary of 1300/1400 euros goes quickly, and it’s immediately purchasing power that people no longer have. There are PSA couples so the loss of wages is multiplied by two. But the bill is not halved at the end of the month: the price of gasoline, pasta, rice. Everything is increasing and today we are told you stay at home and you will lose wages”.
Uncertainties about a potential recovery
For all unions contacted, the future now seems blurry on the Sochaux site: “It is the total unknown, we find ourselves in the situation of two years ago, during the health crisis, where we do not know if tomorrow we will have semiconductors to manufacture our vehicles. How long will it last, when will we be able to start again properly? No one can tell“explains Eric Peultier of Force Ouvrière.
Same feeling of sailing on sight at the CFDT explains its representative Benoit Vernier, who explains that the morale of the employees is affected: “We had dissatisfaction after the failure of the employee negotiations, immediately after there was the war in Ukraine, and that made people switch their minds to something else, to see only the concern for the future. Employees realize that the situation is fragile, and that it can get worse in a sense as well as improve. But the prospects show rather that it will get worse. The climate is gloomy“.
strategic choices
Once again the question arises of the French and European industrial strategy in terms of manufacturing semiconductors: “we must quickly get back around the table so that we can find semiconductor manufacturers in France or Europe and that we are not dependent on suppliers who are thousands of kilometers from us” summarizes Jérôme Boussard.