Audi staff steal keys to 200 cars as plant closure fears boil over

Workers at an Audi factory in Brussels have stolen the keys to around 200 new cars at the plant in a show of anger at plans potentially to close the site.

It is a further blow to Volkswagen, Audi’s parent company, which has announced that it is considering plant closures in Germany, and to the wider German automotive industry, for years renowned as the proud engine of the country’s economy and envied for possessing skilled engineers with an iron work ethic.

Much like its parent, Audi is struggling with adverse market conditions. The brand famous for its sports cars suffered a year-on-year decline of 9.5 per cent during the first half of 2024 to €30.9 billion. Demand for its Brussels-produced Q8 e-tron model has been particularly weak. The upmarket electric sports utility vehicle is said to be struggling to attract buyers in China, the world’s largest market for electric cars.

Some officials in Berlin have blamed the VW Group’s overall struggles on a strategy of shifting from internal combustion engines to electric cars.

Audi announced in July that it was considering closing the Brussels plant after 70 years of production for Volkswagen, which would mark its first ever closure in Europe. The industrial action that followed culminated in employees stealing 200 sets of keys over the weekend. Workers vowed to let no car leave the plant, according to Belgian media reports, in an attempt to force the company’s leaders to clarify the site’s future.

Bosses struck back, however, setting a deadline for the keys to be returned by Monday afternoon and threatening to involve the police as those responsible could be identified via CCTV. According to Audi, workers’ representatives had indicated that they would back down but had said they were unable to return the keys because the plant was closed. Audi was understood to have approached them with alternative solutions to pass on the keys. The company also stated that the “information and consultation process” on the future of the plant was continuing.

Wider relations between Volkswagen and its employees seem to be heavily strained, not least since the company scrapped a scheme that had been guaranteeing safe jobs since 1994. On Sunday it emerged that VW was losing €1 billion a year because of absent workers. Bild, the German newspaper, reported that almost 10 per cent of the carmaker’s assembly line workers were absent from work at any one time, on average. The company’s target value is less than 4 per cent.

Working time fraud is said to be the most common reason for dismissals at Volkswagen, with 800 cases of disciplinary action being taken last year. This reflects a broader trend, as Germans consistently have worked less in recent years than their peers in the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development.