Volkswagen chief executive Oliver Blume faced open hostility from the company's own works council at employee assemblies in Wolfsburg and Braunschweig on 25 August, after he declined to give concrete details on the fate of roughly 100,000 jobs and four German plants.
Works council chair breaks with the board
Daniela Cavallo, chair of the group works council (Gesamtbetriebsratsvorsitzende), told the Wolfsburg gathering that her trust in the management board is "erschüttert" — shaken. "Mit einem CEO, der seinen Leuten nicht sagt, was ist, lässt sich nicht arbeiten," she said: "You cannot work with a CEO who does not tell his people what is." The remark drew loud applause from the workforce, according to participants cited by taz.de.
Cavallo's intervention marks a rare public rupture between labour representatives and the executive suite at Germany's largest industrial employer. The works council holds half the seats on Volkswagen's supervisory board and has veto power over plant closures.
The numbers Blume would not pin down
Blume confirmed that the board still expects an additional 50,000 job cuts on top of 50,000 reductions already announced, bringing the total to roughly 100,000 roles at risk. About half of the new cuts — approximately 25,000 — would fall in Germany, he said.
But the chief executive characterised the 50,000 figure as a "theoretische Rechengröße" — a theoretical calculation derived from cost targets — not a fixed target. He left open what that means for the specific sites and workers affected.
For four plants — Volkswagen's Emden, Hannover and Zwickau factories, and the Audi plant in Neckarsulm — Blume repeated that no "competitive utilisation for the 2030s" can yet be shown. He insisted, however, that closures are not decided.
| Plant | Brand | Location | Status per Blume |
|---|---|---|---|
| Emden | Volkswagen | Lower Saxony | No competitive utilisation shown for 2030s; closure not decided |
| Hannover | Volkswagen | Lower Saxony | No competitive utilisation shown for 2030s; closure not decided |
| Zwickau | Volkswagen | Saxony | No competitive utilisation shown for 2030s; closure not decided |
| Neckarsulm | Audi | Baden-Württemberg | No competitive utilisation shown for 2030s; closure not decided |
July's failed push foreshadows September showdown
The assemblies come five weeks after management attempted to push through cost measures that would have implied plant closures. That effort failed in the supervisory board, where labour representatives hold parity. The episode suggests the board is unwilling to endorse closures without a clearer business case — or without concessions from the works council.
Blume's appearances this week were billed as the start of a series of visits to address concerns ahead of a supervisory board meeting on 4 September, where a new cost-cutting package is expected to be put to a vote. The company did not say whether the package will include explicit closure proposals or further detail on the 50,000 additional cuts.
What happens next
The 4 September supervisory board meeting is the next hard deadline. If management returns with a revised programme that again implies plant closures, the works council's veto will be tested. Cavallo's public rebuke signals she will not accept vague "theoretical calculations" as a basis for negotiations. For the 100,000 workers whose roles are in scope, the gap between a theoretical number and a negotiated outcome remains wide.