Ford's Jaguar says to cut about 400 jobs

LONDON, Sept 19, 2002; Reuters is reporting that Jaguar, the luxury British car business of the Ford Motor Co, said on Thursday it was cutting about 400 jobs or three percent of its workforce as its parent Ford continues a worldwide restructuring to reduce costs.

"We are opening a voluntary programme for about 400 people in the company," said Jaguar corporate communications manager Kay Francis.

Ford, the world's second largest automaker, is nine months into a long restructuring involving slashing jobs and vehicle production costs as increasing competition, particularly from Asian automakers, bites into earnings.

Francis said Jaguar would not move to sack employees if it did not get 400 workers to accept voluntary retirement. Jaguar employs 12,000 people, of which 10,600 are based in Britain.

"We are pretty confident that we will comfortably achieve the levels we are looking for," Francis said. "It is a very competitive package we are offering.

"We are in a position where we are adjusting our skills mix, so we may be letting some people go in some areas but at the same time, we are still taking on new people -- we've taken on about 95 new graduates across the business."