THOMAS SAMSON / AFP
In 2023, during a previous mobilization of Auchan employees.
POLICY – Social plan alert. The mass distribution company Auchan is preparing to announce the elimination of more than 2,000 jobs in France. Figures that should still be taken with a grain of salt, since employee representatives must be informed by their management this Tuesday, November 5, during a Social and Economic Committee (CSE). Officially, the meeting aims to make “an update on the company’s situation and its projects”but in reality, everyone knows what that means.
No one has any illusions about the fatal outcome of layoffs, for which all trades are affected. The multinational, owned by the wealthy Mulliez family, has been experiencing economic difficulties for several years, exacerbated by the war in Ukraine.
For the left, this announcement has the effect of a bomb. “As always, employees will pay for the mistakes of their management, says LFI vice-president of the National Assembly Clémence Guetté. As a reminder, the 800 shareholders of the Auchan group shared 1 billion euros in dividends in 2022-2023”.
Already in 2020, the group had announced the elimination of nearly 1,500 positions in France, after a previous voluntary departure plan of more than 500 positions the same year. “ Auchan received 500 million euros from the CICE a few years ago”also annoys the Insoumis deputy Aurélien Le Coq. According to him, “they gorge themselves, empty the coffers for the profits of shareholders then lay off”.
“It’s incomprehensible”
“Scandalous”exclaims LFI MP Gabrielle Cathala, for whom “the Mulliez are tax exiled in Belgium”. She emphasizes that “the fortune of the Mulliez family has multiplied by 4 in 25 years” and recalls that last year, the brand generated 33 billion euros in turnover. “Removing positions is incomprehensible”she exclaims. Before bringing your “employee support”. The exact fortune of the family that owns Auchan is not known. But the economic magazine Challenges ranked her in 2023 as the eighth richest in the country, with a fortune estimated at 20 billion euros.
The president of the LFI group Mathilde Panot deplores the government's wait-and-see attitude on the subject. “Layoff plans are increasing but the Barnier government will do nothingshe regrets. He is too busy hitting the civil servants who keep public services at arm’s length”. The Mulliez fortune, she calculated, is equivalent to “1.3 million years of minimum wage” or to “the entire budget of public nursery and primary schools”. Of the “crisis profiteers”according to her. First secretary of the Socialist Party, Olivier Faure, for his part, simply relayed an advisor's post, recalling the amount of public aid garnered by the company. Reactions which should increase in intensity in the event of formalization of the social plan.
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