STEELMAKER ArcelorMittal is considering shifting thousands of support jobs from Europe to India, according to a senior employees' representative.
The plan could affect more than 5,600 support-function jobs in 20 countries across Europe, Jean-Luc Ruffin, secretary of the works council for the company’s staff in Europe, told AFP on Thursday.
ArcelorMittal Europe had already announced a first wave of relocations last year. Ruffin said that move affected around 4,000 jobs, including 1,400 job losses.
The works council said in a statement that the latest plan targets roles in areas such as IT, logistics and maintenance.
It described the move as an "attack on European workers... without consideration for the human, social and industrial consequences".
The council called for the new plans to be halted until last year’s relocations are completed and reviewed.
ArcelorMittal Europe said in a statement that it was "looking into the possibility of expanding the scope of its project to transform support functions, with the goal of ensuring optimisation and standardisation of activities which are currently fragmented across a large number of sites in Europe".
It added that "the creation of a business services hub in India and expanding the company's business centre of excellence in Poland will support in creating a sustainable business model for ArcelorMittal Europe".
(With inputs from agencies)
