In yet another blow to the British car industry, Aston Martin has announced that it is to cut 600 jobs – half of which are actually full time posts. The luxury car maker, who employs around 1,800 people, blamed the downturn (who isn’t) on the loss of the roles.
Naturally, our thoughts go out to the workers who have unfortunately lost their jobs at a particularly hard time of year. Perhaps tellingly, Aston Martin sold only 110 cars in October this year, compared to the same month last year when they managed 164 sales.
I hate to say it – as I have huge respect for the man – but there’s just something a little hollow about the words that Dr Ulrich Bez spoke in response to this crisis of a third of the workforce being laid off. Particularly, his statement of “the Aston Martin brand is the strongest it has ever been”. I just feel that would stick in the throat of some of the workers who’ll be leaving the factory for the last time.
To be honest, I’m actually surprised that Aston Martin has had sales problems – it’s not really like the super rich (footballers etc) will really have been affected too badly by the credit crunch or the government’s advice to businesses of not giving employees pay rises that are higher than inflation.
We can all only hope that the British car industry picks up shortly – as this isn’t any good for any of us.
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