Ricke said at Wednesday’s news conference that 16,000 Ford workers voting this year have never been through a contract negotiation process before.
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Union workers at Ford’s truck assembly plant in Claycomo have dented the push to ratify the new labor agreement worked out between Ford and the UAW.
But, following more consultations with union members throughout the GM manufacturing system, United Auto Workers have made a decision to resume negations.
Volkswagen had also argued that the union was seeking to carve out a group of workers more likely to vote for the UAW after it lost last year’s election, and questioned the timing of the effort to hold an election amid the fallout of the diesel emissions cheating scandal that has engulfed the company. So far, 55 percent of the union workers at about half the plants in the country have voted in favor of the contract.
“We remain committed to obtaining an agreement that is good for employees and the business”, said GM spokeswoman Katie McBride. “A lot of people, especially younger people, think you just go and open door No. 2 and see if something is behind door No. 2. That is not how real negotiations go”, he said.
Settles warned workers that the UAW is unlikely to get a better contract if the first deal is rejected.
IG Metall, by contrast, started the year with 2.3 million members, and plays a strong role on the German boards of numerous same companies operating in the USA without any formal labor representation.
The company says that won’t have an impact for jobs – it’s more to free up space to make the Ford Escape. “Did I get everything back? No”.
Its goals are to improve wages and working conditions among German automotive employers and to promote the German-style “works councils” to represent both hourly and salaried plant employees.
There are about 162 skilled trades workers at the plant, making up about 12 percent of the total blue-collar workforce.
A few workers have expressed concern over the deal’s eight-year progression for workers to earn a top wage; they believe it should be shorter.
That wage progression largely follows a pattern that the UAW set in September when it reached an agreement with FCA. “If they’re not gonna recoup all the concessions they’ve made in the past now, when are they going to recoup them?” It was three years under the previous contract. “No more tiers” – those are their words, not mine”, Springowski said, referring to slogans the UAW used at its bargaining convention in March.
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Estrada also told leadership that she planned to meet with General Motors to clarify a few language in the contract and to address specific issues brought up by skilled trades. For example, it calls for an $8,000 signing bonus instead of $4,000 bonuses at Fiat Chrysler.
