Last week, Sony said it would be cutting 400 jobs at its south Wales plants at Bridgend and Pencoed, with the company refocusing on digital television production.

Cutbacks: Sony is axing 400 jobs

Mr Fowler said that all 1,800 permanent staff at the Pansonic plant at Pentwyn had been offered the choice of voluntary redundancy and that 1,000 workers had applied for the package.

He added that the redundancy offer would remain open until Friday, when the final 700 would be chosen from across all departments.

"We are moving from being a volume producer to being a value producer," Mr Fowler said.

The redundancies will not come into force until Christmas, when temporary staff reach the end of their contracts.

Production transfer

From 2001, the remaining workforce will continue to produce televisions, microwave ovens, laptop computers, plasma TVs and projection televisions.

All other production is due to be transferred to a Czech plant, which has been open for four years, which currently employs 800 to 1,000 people and where more were now expected to be taken on.

Welsh Assembly presiding officer Dafydd Elis-Thomas said an urgent debate on the Panasonic job losses would take place on Thursday.

Jon Owen Jones MP: 'Enormous down-sizing'

The news was broken in the assembly chamber during a debate on careers education.

Jon Owen Jones MP said the switch by companies to digital production would only benefit domestic markets in the short-term.

Competing on an international level raised deeper questions about the pound and the euro, he said.

"We desperately need a strategy to save maufacturing.

"No-one is saying we should go into the euro with the pound at its current level.

"People do not seem to understand how important it is for our manufacturing base that we compete on equal terms with our European partners."

Liberal Democrat Assembly member for Cardiff Central Jenny Randerson said: "The sheer scale of these job losses is devastating and the effects will be felt far beyond Cardiff."

'Further bad news'

Plaid Cymru's economic development spokesperson Dr Phil Williams called on Welsh Assembly First Minister Rhodri Morgan to meet Chancellor Gordon Brown to discuss "the deepening crisis in the Welsh economy".

"These policies are beneficial to south east England but disastrous for the manufacturing regions in the north of England and in Wales where companies have to find efficiency savings in the face of the strong pound.

"As long as the Government refuses to make its mind up on the euro then we can only expect further bad news similar to that announced today," Dr Williams added.