Jaguar Land Rover to cut 4,500 jobs from UK workforce

Jaguar Land Rover has announced it will be cutting 4,500 jobs as part of a £2.5 billion cost-cutting plan that could pose a significant detrimental impact to the UK’s plastics industry supply chain.

The job losses will come from JLR’s 40,000 strong UK workforce.

A number of high-profile British suppliers for JLR are likely to suffer as it focuses on plants in China and Slovakia in the lead-up to a potential no-deal Brexit.

In July, JLR said it needed more certainty around the Brexit deal in order to continue investing in its UK operations, and that the uncertainty would eventually take its toll on the perception of the UK as a stable and competitive base for global manufacturing.

JLR’s supply chain, including service providers and research and development, supports over a quarter of a million jobs within the UK industry, and the cuts are likely to cause serious disruption within it.

Ralf Speth, CEO of Jaguar Land Rover, said: “We are taking decisive action to help deliver long-term growth in the face of multiples geopolitical and regulatory disruptions as well as technology challenges facing the automotive industry. Decisive action will help deliver resilient long-term growth as Jaguar Land Rover implements cost and profit improvements.”