Unite boss to meet PSA on Friday for clarity over growing job concerns at Vauxhall plants
Unite boss Len McCluskey plans to meet PSA chief executive Carlos Tavares on Friday to discuss concerns over UK jobs at Vauxhall plants in the prospective deal between Peugeot-maker PSA and General Motors.
The union confirmed the plans are for the two to meet at the end of the week, but said as yet there were no further details on time or venue.
PSA is in talks with GM to buy its European operations, which includes the Opel and Vauxhall brands. Unite wants to secure guarantees over jobs at the company's two UK plants in Ellesmere Port and Luton, and McCluskey has said he will use the meeting "to press the case for the UK's world class facilities and workforce".
Read more: Unite wants Nissan assurances for Vauxhall plants in the UK
He added that the thousands of workers at the plants "deserve a strong backer and a positive future".
Ellesmere Port, which makes the Astra hatchback, imports three quarters of its components and 80 per cent of the vehicles it makes are sold into the EU, which has raised concerns over how it'd be impacted post-Brexit.
Pensions have been another potential obstacle raised; Vauxhall's pension scheme is one of the largest in the UK with 15,000 members.
Pensions expert John Ralfe said he didn't think PSA would want to touch it "with a barge pole", saying he thought it had a deficit of around £1bn. He told BBC's Today programme half of the members were pensioners.
It comes as a Downing Street spokesperson told reporters today that the Prime Minister's meeting with Tavares will be "a private conversation".
"There's been a request for a meeting and we will try to make that meeting happen, but I am not going into what the nature of that conversation will be," the spokesman said, adding that the timing of the meeting will depend on "diary compatibility".
Read more: Greg Clark heads to Paris talks with French government and PSA over GM deal
The expectation is that the cost-cutting PSA boss will slash outgoings at Opel to restore it to profitability.
The meetings follow those held last week involving business secretary Greg Clark, who met GM President Dan Ammann and then went on to Paris to meet the Peugeot board and France's industry minister.