Aerospace giant Airbus says it plans to cut 15,000 jobs as it deals with the effects of the coronavirus crisis.

It will cut 1,700 jobs in the UK, along with thousands more in Germany, Spain and elsewhere.

The move is subject to talks with unions which have opposed compulsory redundancies.

The Unite union said the Airbus announcement was “another act of industrial vandalism” against the UK aerospace sector.

Some 134,000 people work for Airbus worldwide, with around a tenth of them in the UK.

The firm said the UK cuts would fall only on the commercial aircraft division at its two sites at Broughton in Flintshire and Filton, Bristol.

More details of the job losses and how they will break down between the two giant factories will come at the end of the week after talks with unions.

However, Unite said it expected 1,116 manufacturing jobs and 611 office-based jobs to go, shrinking Airbus’s UK workforce by 15%.

The firm expects to make the cuts by summer 2021, but hopes the majority of redundancies will be voluntary or through early retirement of staff.

The company warned in April that it was “bleeding cash at an unprecedented speed” as it struggled with the impact of the coronavirus crisis.