Motormouth boss puts spanner in works by saying French toil harder than the British

Yesterday should have been a day of triumph for the Toyota workers of Burnaston. The car manufacturer revealed that its Midlands plant was about to become the first in the world to export Toyotas (the new Avensis model) to Japan. In the words of one assembly employee, this was an opportunity to do something to counter the irritating Japanese belief "that no one in the world can produce cars quite like they can''.

But the unprecedented vote of confidence was fatally undermined by an extraordinary attack on the industriousness of Toyota's British workforce by one of the company's most senior executives.

Kosuke Shiramizu, the company's board member in charge of global production, said production at Toyota's new Valenciennes plant, near Lille, France, was 20 per cent higher than that at the Burnaston factory in Derby because the British workers were not as hardworking.

"In France, there are many unemployed people and so those with jobs tend to work harder,'' he said, adding that Thai workers were also preferable to the British, who prefer to "job hop". Mr Shiramizu also criticised workers in America, saying they "were rather wealthy and therefore don't want to work too hard".

Mr Shiramizu's comments could hardly have been calculated to cause more offence. They certainly brought out a rash of anti-French sentiment among Toyota workers at their preferred pub, the Green Man in Willington. "Truth of the matter is, we can't stand them,'' said one lunchtime drinker, who said the Derby factory's work ethic stretched to the management "giving you a footstool if you turn up with your leg in plaster''.

The management was equally perplexed by Mr Shiramizu's comments, which come at a time when the plant is increasing its levels of compulsory overtime to meet the Japanese demand for the Avensis models. Japan is importing for the first time because of a new-found taste for European models.

The Derby management said its own figures ranked the plant, which produced 211,000 cars last year, as the third most productive in Europe. In the most diplomatic tones possible, it pointed out that Valenciennes produced one model (the Yaris) while Derby produced two, the Avensis and Corolla. Two models needed "greater flexibility", a spokeswoman said.

Derby's workers are bound by their contracts not to speak publicly about their employer but a worker aged 40 whose job is to carry parts to the production line said that Mr Shiramizu's comments must be a device to drive down workers' demands at the forthcoming pay round. "We work all hours. My kids are older now but his aren't and he never sees them,'' he said, gesturing to a colleague as they ate sandwiches in his car during the 45-minute lunch break. "They say there's no overtime at Vallenciennes,'' he added. "But here they've just announced a full Saturday's day work for the new Avensis – and the nightshift lads are going to be coming in on a Sunday.''

The shift had begun at 8am and was scheduled to finish at 4.30pm with a 15-minute tea break at 10am and a further 10-minute stop at 3pm. If productivity levels were too low, a notice would be posted up at "second break" to announce compulsory overtime of up to two hours. By 9pm, the nightshift arrived to work until 5.30am. Employees work two weeks of days and two weeks of nights on the assembly line.

The problem for workers and management at Derby is that no one seems able to agree on whether Mr Shiramizu is right about British productivity. In terms of GDP per person employed, Britain certainly trails France. The US tops that table, with Britain below average – and Japan worse still. But the figures are corrupted by currency movements, which say nothing on a nation's productivity.

There's a different story for car production. The World Markets Research Centre in London said Mr Shiramizu's comments did not "stack up'' against its annual study on automotive productivity, which divides a plant's unit output by the number of assembly line employees.

The organisation said that Britain, buoyed by the number of Japanese plants run by Nissan, Honda and Toyota, had the most productive record in Europe – and that France came bottom. Derby is fourth in the Europe-wide survey though Valenciennes does not feature because it was built in January 2001 and was viewed as too new to earn an accurate ranking. Washington, which has been plagued by double-digit unemployment, has topped the WMRC study for the past six years with its Nissan plant – proof, perhaps, that Mr Shiramizu's remarks about areas with high unemployment working harder are as relevant to Britain as to France. A WMRC study last year concluded that British plants produced 67.3 cars per worker, compared with 52 in France.

Another factor assisting the performance of British workers has been the adoption of flexible manufacturing systems – a Japanese innovation that enables factories to produce many different models on the same production line and to avoid down time when switching from producing one model to another. Swindon's Honda plant and Nissan at Washington are fine exponents.

But profitability is a different matter. The exchange rate and the fact that British factories are building their cars in pounds and selling them in euros has made for heavy losses at Derby, Swindon and Washington in recent years.

Toyota's British plants – which export 75 per cent of output to the Continent – lost £130m on manufacturing in 2001 and are expected only to halve the loss in 2002, after a drive to increase profitability that has included cost-cutting and introducing the Corolla.

Derby has had a worrying few years, including talk of big job losses. The annual pay round has not helped the drive to increase profitability. A pay row over a 7.3 per cent rise has engulfed Peugeot/Citroen in the Midlands and Nissan also confronted potential unrest over a 3 per cent offer two months ago.

If Mr Shiramizu was aiming to head off similar disruptions, his efforts may have backfired. Last night, Derek Simpson, the general secretary of the Amicus union, demanded a meeting with the management. "We want to see an apology to our workers,'' he said. "And if none is forthcoming, we can only look on the dark side.''