Sunday, 31 May 2009

EU ministers to meet over troubled carmaker Opel[fr] 

http://www.euractiv.com/en/transport/eu-ministers-meet-troubled-carmaker-opel/article-182718


Published: Thursday 28 May 2009   

The European Commission has called a meeting of European trade and economy ministers for Friday (29 May) to discuss the future of carmaker Opel and its plants in Europe, a spokesman said.

Overnight talks in Berlin between German authorities and officials from Opel's parent, General Motors, failed to produce a deal on state funding to keep Opel afloat if GM files for bankruptcy.

Governments of European member states that have Opel plants are following the talks closely because they want to save jobs.

The meeting is scheduled to take place in Brussels at 2pm. Industry ministers from all of the bloc's 27 member states have been invited, a spokesman for EU Industry Commissioner Günter Verheugen said today. He gave no further details of the talks.

The EU executive appealed this month for national governments to stick to EU state aid rules and said they should avoid moves that would ensure the survival of Opel factories on their soil at the cost of others elsewhere.

The jostling over Opel, the target of at least two rival bidders, is the latest threat to EU market rules after French President Nicolas Sarkozy offered state aid to French carmakers in return for unwritten pledges not to close plants in France (EurActiv 10/02/09).

The €6 billion French scheme provoked criticism from other countries in the bloc and was only approved by the EU in February, after Paris gave guarantees that the loan arrangements contained no protectionist elements (EurActiv 01/03/09).

GM has plants in Belgium, Poland and Spain for Opel, Vauxhall in Britain and Saab in Sweden.

"We cannot get into a situation where everyone is trying to outdo each other, in which we see how much money Germany can put on the table and how much we can," Flemish Premier Kris Peeters said this week, raising concerns over the future of some 2,600 Belgian jobs at Opel's Antwerp plant.

Mr Peeters said he and Belgian Prime Minister Herman Van Rompuy had written to Germany and the European Commission demanding Opel's future be settled at a European level.

Both the Belgian national government and the Flanders region will be represented at the EU talks, Belgian officials said.

Meanwhile, EU ministers in charge of competitiveness agreed to freeze any additional regulation on the car industry. "Given the current economic situation in the sector, creating additional burdens for the industry needs to be avoided if possible," the ministers said in a statement Pdf external today. 

"New legislative measures need to be taken with utmost caution and should be preceded by thorough impact assessments respecting the current conditions."

(EurActiv with Reuters.)

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Posted by Britannia Radio at 19:15