in Toulouse, employees protest against the social plan of the manufacturer's space and defense division

Recruited in 2019 at Airbus DS (“Defence and Space”), the branch of the European aircraft manufacturer producing satellites, Hamida Saouiki has already undergone two social plans. “It’s starting to get tired and it’s tiring. Because we don't know where we're going, we navigate by sight. It's like we're hamsters in a wheel.”this quality engineer despairs, before joining her colleagues gathered in front of the entrance to the Toulouse site, a tray covered with oriental pastries in hand.

At the call of the CGT and the UNSA, around a hundred employees mobilized during the lunch break on Friday December 6 to protest against the reorganization plan for the space and defense division of Airbus. The day before, the details of the Proton plan – that’s its name – were presented to the central social economic committee (CSE) and to the establishment CSEs.

This restructuring, which will be carried out until mid-2026, provides for the elimination of 2,043 positions out of the 37,000 in the sector worldwide, especially in Europe. Germany pays the heaviest price with 689 positions. France is also affected with the loss of 540 positions out of a workforce of 7,500 people. In Toulouse, the site is cut by 424 jobs, that of Elancourt, in Yvelines, by 116 jobs.

But this desire to reduce the workforce is not a surprise for employees. Since October 16, the company's management, weighed down by provisions worth nearly 1.6 billion euros due in particular to development delays and additional costs linked to the new Onesat geostationary telecommunications satellites, had announced its intention to eliminate up to 2,500 positions.

“This announcement is a stock market transaction”

Even if this figure has been revised downwards, the new count still does not suit the CGT. “This announcement is a stock market transaction. Management seeks short-term profitability”says Benoît Thiébault, general secretary of the third union organization in the space division. The satellite propulsion engineer, who joined Airbus DS eight years ago, is pleading for the pure and simple withdrawal of this unjustified plan, according to him, due to the workload weighing on employees.

“There is a dip in manufacturing activity in 2025, he admits. But this six-month gap is temporary. And we have a full order book, with three to four years of visibility in engineering”assures Mr. Thiébault. To argue, he also mentions the European Iris program²an acronym for Infrastructure for Resilience and Secure Interconnection by Satellites, for which the manufacturing of the constellation of 290 satellites, providing high-speed Internet, has been awarded to Airbus DS and Thales Alenia Space.

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