France’s CGT labour union began talks with Veolia Environnement on March 20, 2013, concerning 1,500 jobs the company wishes to cut at its French water division.STRINGER/FRANCE/Reuters
French water and waste firm Veolia Environnement has started talks with unions about cutting 1,500 jobs in its French water business.
The group employs 230,000 people worldwide, including 26,900 in its French water business, which has been under pressure from the economic crisis as municipalities squeeze its margins.
"Management has opened talks with the unions about employment at the company. This concerns 1,500 jobs in our water business in France," a company spokeswoman said on Wednesday.
An official with the CGT union told Reuters the talks would continue until June with a view to putting a redundancy plan in place by the end of this year.
"At the works council yesterday the company announced a voluntary redundancies plan that would concern 1,500 people and possible more," CGT union representative Franck Le Roux told Reuters.
Last year, the company was forced to sell about €3.5 billion ($4.6-billion) worth of assets to reduce debt and had to withdraw from half of the countries in which it operated.
Veolia is the world's largest private supplier of drinking water, providing water for 100 million people, and treating waste water for 71 million people.