Jaguar Land Rover job cuts are looming even as JLR said it has upskilled 10,500 workers across its modernisation drive. The company is pushing ahead with electrification while facing falling profits and restructuring pressure, leaving employees in Solihull and Wolverhampton tied to a wider shift in how the group will build future models.
10,500 workers have now been upskilled, with about 9,000 employees in Solihull and a further 1,500 in Wolverhampton receiving training. JLR said the move sits alongside new battery and electric drive unit production lines, and its electric propulsion manufacturing centre in Wolverhampton is now producing battery packs and electric drive units alongside internal combustion engines.
Raj Kandola on Midlands jobs
4,000 jobs are expected to go under JLR's restructuring plan, but the company has not set out how those reductions will be split across locations. Raj Kandola, deputy CEO at Greater Birmingham Chambers of Commerce, called Land Rover's decision to produce a fully electric model a “real vote of confidence” for the Midlands.
“The fact that an anchor institution like Jaguar Land Rover (JLR) is making a huge investment of this scale speaks volumes,” he said. “It sends a signal out to the wider market that this is a fantastic region where anchor institutions can build new models and can really invest.”
JLR's £1.9bn pressure
£1.9bn is the estimated cost of a cyber attack on JLR a year ago, and that hit came before the latest round of falling profits and supply-chain disruption. The company is trying to modernise and electrify at the same time as it works through that financial strain, a combination that explains why training is continuing even as job losses are planned.
Martin Limpert said the launch was a pivotal moment for Range Rover, JLR, West Midlands businesses, partners, retailers and communities. “There is a big focus on our people,” he said, adding that the move “secures jobs and supports the economy.”
7% of jobs in Wolverhampton were in manufacturing last year, according to data gathered by the City of Wolverhampton Council, which makes the plant's shift more than a product story for the city. For workers and suppliers in the West Midlands, the immediate issue is whether JLR's investment in electrification can hold together the jobs base while the restructuring plan runs its course.
