On September 18th/19th, 2024, the European Works Council (EWC) of Siemens Energy held its 4th meeting in Porto. 26 delegates from 15 countries (Germany, UK, Denmark, Spain, Sweden, Portugal, Austria, France, Hungary, Romania, Norway, Czech Republic, Croatia, Italy and Netherlands) took part in the meeting. Only the delegate from Poland was missing.
Nadine Florian (Germany), the chairwoman of the EWC, opened the meeting. In her speech, she mentioned the situation in the EU after the election of the new EU parlia-ment in June, the status quo of the integration of the wind power business in the company Siemens Energy, the very positive order backlog and the planned increase of jobs in the sector Grid Technologies. She also described the negative aspects of the current situation, such as work overload and under-capacities. The expansion of capacities is necessary also in Europe, not only in India.
It is still unclear, in which way the job cuts in the onshore wind power business in Spain can be compensated by employment at the other parts of Siemens Energy in the country.
Nadine Florian also explained the planned improvements of the information and consultation process of the EWC, which are discussed with the management. Additionally, the EWC intends to add one day of training for the EWC delegates to each meeting.
Next year, the mandates of the EWC delegates have to be renewed. The delegates, the unions and the HR departments will be informed. Nadine Florian welcomed Catarina Barata as new delegate from Portugal. She will replace Helena Dias. The delegates gave a brief presentation of themselves.
Helena Dias gave a short overview of Siemens Energy in Portugal. Rebeca Ribes (Spain; speaker of the region South Western Europe) gave a report of the region South Western Europe. She pointed out, that there is a lot of uncertainty in this region. Only in France (Le Havre) and Italy, there is the announcement of a job increase. But there are also many contract workers in Le Havre. Jens Sörensen (Denmark; speaker for the region North Western region) gave a report on the situation in his region, supported by Stein Olsen (Norway). He mentioned the outsourcing of service activities in Denmark to external companies. Stein Olsen especially criticized the top-ic of the planned centralization of engineering activities in the field of digitalization in India. Johannes Kopp (Austria; speaker of the region Central Eastern Europe) gave a report on the sit-uation in his region. He mentioned that there will be an increase of jobs in Austria and Hungary. He also said that the number of contract workers in Austria is too high. The employee repre-sentatives demand to employ them directly at Siemens Energy. Miroslav Duduković (Croatia) explained to the delegates the difficult situation of the current wage negotiations.
Robert Kensbock (Germany; Deputy Chairman of the EWC) explained to the delegates the situation in Germany. The order situation of the factories in Germany is general positive. A part of the transformer business will be integrated in a Joint Venture with another transform-er company. The final decision on this Joint Venture is expected for next month. This will concern in Europe locations in Germany and Hungary.
João Ribeiro from the Portuguese union Fiequimetal gave a welcome note from his union to the delegates. Nadine Florian offered the union any requested support and cooperation with the EWC. Manuel Bloemers (IG Metall, Germany) addressed the delegates as European coordinator for Siemens Energy from the side of the unions. He criticized the inadequate consultation process concerning the announced job cuts in the wind power business of Siemens Energy.
He expressed his worries regarding the growing support for right wing parties in Europe and emphasized the importance of active support for democracy. He finally presented a declaration of the EWC of Siemens Energy and IndustriAll Europe, which calls for active industrial policy by the EU commission to protect Europe from becoming de-pendent on imports of wind power from China. The delegates of the EWC unanimously agreed to this declaration.
The EWC delegates discussed various further topics, such as health and safety, the transition of jobs in the wind power sector from onshore to offshore resp. other business fields inside the company, the integration of the wind power sector into Siemens Energy and the problems with recruitment of work force. Nadine Florian presented the dates of the EWC meetings of next year.
On the second day of the meeting, Mr. Holt (member of the board of directors and HR director), Mrs. Schulte-Kutsch (head of HR), Mrs. Schütz (head of HR of SGRE) and several other repre-sentatives of HR joined the meeting representing the management. Mrs. Loureiro (CEO Portugal) and Mr. Costa (SGRE Portugal) gave some information on Siemens Energy in Portugal.
Mr. Holt gave a report on the current situation of the company. He described the situation as rather positive in general, but still problematic in the wind power business. The order backlog is generally high. Especially the sector “Grid Technologies” needs an expansion of its capacities and further investment. He said, that the rate of employment of women is still unsatisfactory in the company. The EWC delegates then discussed their issues with Mr. Holt.
Nadine Florian appreciated the overall growing number of employees and the new investment, but said, that the EWC also expects the solution of difficult situations in some countries. Stein Olsen expressed his worries about the concentration and centralization of certain engi-neering activities in India and the insufficient communication by the management on this. Mr. Holt answered, that this measure is aiming in first place at standard solutions. He agreed to the necessity of better communication.
Luis Nuin (Spain) asked about the activities of the management to create jobs for employees of the wind power business, who will lose their jobs, and of the possibility of installing a train-ing and apprenticeship center in Southern Europe to ensure and support the recruitment and training of skilled workers. Mr. Holt and Mrs. Schulte-Kutsch said, that there are activities, but more analysis has to be done.
Manuel Bloemers criticized the growing dependency on imports from China, especially in the wind power sector, and also the information and consultation process concerning the an-nounced job cuts in the wind power business of Siemens Energy. He also addressed the issue of missing access to computers for many blue collar workers. Mr. Holt answered, that the investment in China is being reduced and that the company is aim-ing at avoiding any kind of “single source” supply situation. He said, that the management is trying to give every employee access to computers by in-stalling work stations, which can be accessed by everyone, and granting access by smart phones.
Mrs. Schulte-Kutsch explained the current state of the integration of the wind power sector into the structures of Siemens Energy. The delegates especially asked for the detailed plans for each country and demanded the guarantee of current standards of working conditions for every employee. Miroslav Duduković addressed the specific issue of the wage negotiations in Croatia, which are stuck. Mrs. Schulte-Kutsch offered her support to find a solution.
Manuel Bloemers criticized the quality of the current information and consultation process at the European Works Council. Nadine Florian said, that there are ongoing discussions with the management to improve this process. Mr. Holt agreed that the process has to become better and of a higher quality.
Mr. Proietti described the measures of the company in the field of “Talent Acquisition”. Nadine Florian and other delegates criticized the recruiting process of the company as too slow and not attractive enough. The delegates also rejected the idea of leading job interviews and recruitment by robots. Mrs. Schulte-Kutsch pointed out, that the big number of applications causes the need to in-crease the efficiency of the recruitment process.
Günter Augustat (Germany) and other delegates criticized, that in several cases, external ap-plicants are preferred to internal employees, who apply for the same job. Luis Nuin demanded to enable realignment qualification for employees, who have to change their job.
Mr. Pubantz gave some information on the policy of Siemens Energy Real Estate. His report was discussed very critically by the delegates. The policy has to be rolled out in accordance with the respective national law and regulations.
The delegates finally discussed internally the course and outcome of the meeting. The discussions underlined the need to change and improve some of the procedures of infor-mation and consultation of the European Works Council. There are already several proposals, which are discussed or even already agreed on with the management.
Nadine Florian and Robert Kensbock offered to the delegates the possibility to send them any open question, so that these questions can still be answered by the management.
(Report: Dirk Linder)