UK business minister to meet Jaguar Land Rover CEO over job cuts

LONDON, Sept 6 (Reuters) - Britain's business minister Jonathan Reynolds said he will meet Jaguar Land Rover's CEO this week to discuss job cuts at the country's biggest carmaker, amid reports it is looking to shed 4,000 roles.

Reynolds told the BBC on Sunday that while he wanted to mitigate job losses, the business environment for carmakers was "challenging" in the UK and across Europe.

"If this is about making sure over time that workforce is right to make the business as competitive as possible, that's the conversation we need to have," Reynolds said on Sunday.

JLR, which employs about 30,000 people in Britain and whose largest plant is in Solihull, West Midlands, is owned by India's Tata Motors. It said in a statement it needed to make £1.7 billion of savings over the next two years and as such it would be opening a voluntary redundancy programme.

TARIFFS AND CHINESE IMPORTS

"We need to adapt to evolving global market conditions," a JLR spokesperson said.

The job cuts would be a setback for Prime Minister Andy Burnham, who took office six weeks ago, and has repeatedly said he wants to "reindustrialise" Britain.

JLR, which also has major sites in central and northern England, has been affected by the fallout from tariffs imposed by U.S. President Donald Trump, as the U.S. is an important market for its luxury Range Rover and Defender models, while competition from Chinese models such as the Jaecoo 7 — ranked third among Britain's top-selling cars — is also hitting sales.

The Times newspaper said 4,000 roles at JLR would be cut over two years through a redundancy programme due to be announced on Monday.

Earlier in September, German carmaker Volkswagen's supervisory board approved a transformation plan that will include cutting 50,000 jobs in its attempt to counter tariffs and Chinese competition.

(Reporting by Sarah Young; Editing by David Holmes)