Volkswagen Group plans to chop practically all evening shifts at its essential plant in Germany as Europe’s largest carmaker continues to battle the semiconductor disaster.

VW will lower the evening shift, which gives employees additional pay, from the beginning of the second quarter on three meeting traces in Wolfsburg, the automaker mentioned Friday, confirming a submit on its intranet seen by Bloomberg Information.

The transfer has drawn ire from labor chief head Daniela Cavallo, who mentioned a compromise on compensation should be discovered.

“Our colleagues aren’t chargeable for the truth that order books are overflowing whereas we won’t make the autos due to the shortage of semiconductors,” Cavallo mentioned within the submit. “We’ll combat for partial compensation.”

Solely a fourth meeting line that handles the Tiguan and its hybrid fashions, the Touran and Seat Tarraco will proceed to run early, late and evening shifts, VW mentioned.

Manufacturing unit employees at VW have been on edge amid rising tensions between the automaker’s highly effective union leaders and CEO Herbert Diess, who hinted at doable job cuts in November to remain aggressive within the face of Tesla and the shift to EV manufacturing.

The worldwide scarcity of chips compelled VW to slash output on the sprawling Wolfsburg manufacturing facility final 12 months. The plant makes the VW Golf, which has persistently been Europe’s top-selling automotive, together with final 12 months with a quantity of 205,720, regardless of a 27 % decline.

Manufacturing stops at Wolfsburg due to the chip disaster restricted Golf manufacturing, ensuing within the tighest race in years for each the No. 1 and No. 2 locations on Europe’s high 10 gross sales chart (see desk, beneath).

The choice to chop the evening shift was made in response to repeated short-notice cancellations and the necessity to furlough employees, the corporate mentioned.

“It’s unavoidable that we regulate our shift mannequin to keep up competitiveness and safe jobs in the long run,” mentioned Gunnar Kilian, the board member accountable for personnel. “Sadly, this step may even contain workforce cuts and the lack of hardship allowances for the evening shift.”