Michelin closes its Vannes factory, mayor David Robo denounces an “earthquake” for the region

POLITICS – One “black day” for Vannes. The announcement by Michelin, this Tuesday, November 5, of the closure of one of its emblematic sites, which will result in the loss of 300 jobs, had the effect of a bomb in this town of Morbihan. “The development of Vannes was closely linked to the arrival of Michelin sixty-three years ago”recalled the mayor (DVD) David Robo on France Info.

The councilor speaks of a “earthquake for the territory” and confides that the employees, “very attached to their work tool”are destroyed. The elected official insists: “This is a very hard blow to the Vannes economy: for a very long time, Michelin was the city’s leading private employer”.

The president of the tire group may well promise not to let “person at the side of the road”for the workers, the blow is severe. The news was announced to them at around 9 a.m., and greeted with great silence. No manager from the headquarters in Clermont-Ferrand had made the trip. Some started burning tires and pallets in front of the gates. The idea of ​​launching a strike movement is under discussion. In Cholet (Maine-et-Loire), another site concerned, the principle of a strike was voted on.

“We saw colleagues collapse because they were still in denial”reports to AFP Morgane Royer, Michelin employee for almost ten years, South union delegate. By 2026, these two sites which employ more than 1,200 people will close their doors. The fault, according to management, lies with ” collapse “ sales of tires for trucks and vans.

“Violent announcement”

Faced with the upcoming layoffs, elected officials, both local and national, promise to do everything to support the ejected employees. “The myth maintained by the government according to which its industrial policy would be a success is shattered against the wall of reality”annoyed the president of the communist group in the National Assembly André Chassaigne.

EPR deputy Denis Masséglia sent a letter to the president of the Economic Affairs Committee Aurélie Trouvé (LFI) to ask her to “summon the management of the Michelin group” in order to hear him on the precise reasons for these thousands of job cuts. Elected in Cholet, he castigates “a violent announcement” for employees and their families and calls on the tire manufacturer to “implement a support plan commensurate with employee commitment”.

“Capitalist Greed”

Economy Minister Antoine Armand said “regret” the decision taken by the global giant, and concedes that these announcements of job cuts are “eminently worrying”. The State will ensure that “employment remains at the heart of the strategy” of the group and by the way “that the priority of this transformation is indeed employment”he confirmed.

LFI MP Antoine Léaument points out “the greed of the capitalists” and in particular dividends per share which “have never been so high”, presenting at the same time a graph ending in 2023. It was indeed a particularly positive year for the tire company. Her colleague Clémence Guetté evokes, “1,200 families sacrificed”.

“Michelin posts 1.98 billion euros net profit in 2023, and has received several tens of millions of euros in public funding via the Research Tax Credit”insists the environmentalist deputy for Morbihan Damien Girard, who hopes that these sums will be used to enable “to decently support employees towards a return to employment”. Especially since “this new economic dramahe continues, joins others in the automobile, pharmaceutical, agri-food industries and job cuts at Auchan”.

The list is long, indeed. “A total of 180 layoff plans and nearly 100,000 jobs at risk”calculated the communist senator Fabien Gay, for whom “it is urgent to have a moratorium on job cuts and to condition aid to businesses”. A sign that the subject is being taken seriously: all the left-wing groups represented in the National Assembly took it up to question the government on how it intended to react to these continuing social tragedies.

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