Hanover, Germany (dpa) - Former Volkswagen chief executive Martin Winterkorn announced Saturday he was also stepping down as chairman of Porsche Holding Company.Winterkorn‘s replacement from November 1 is Hans Dieter Poetsch, the new chairman of the supervisory board at Volkswagen, in which Porsche Holding is the largest shareholder.Winterkorn, 68, stepped down from Volkswagen at the end of September to take responsibility for the emissions scandal that continues to rock the company.Also Saturday, Volkswagen‘s works council told dpa that the company was considering cutting back on contracted workers amid the financial uncertainty following the emissions scandal."As the works council, we will support all possibilities to secure the jobs of our colleagues with temporary contracts," a spokesman for the employees‘ representative body said. "We know that the board of directors is discussing other possibilities."There are thousands of workers on temporary contracts at Volkswagen. The company employs just under 600,000 workers worldwide, according to its most recent figures for June.The US Environmental Protection Agency accused VW on September 18 of installing software designed to circumvent air pollution standards. The company announced four days later that 11 million vehicles were affected worldwide, and since then several countries have launched their own investigations.
