In the bag: CAW reaches deal with Big 3 four months early
Shortly after reaching an agreement with Ford, the Canadian Auto Workers union announced the rather surprising news that it had reached tentative agreements with both General Motors and Chrysler. These deals come about four months before the deadline for a deal was to be hit and stand in stark contrast to the protracted negotiations that recently took place between the Big Three and the CAW's American counterpart, the UAW. Under the new deal, GM promises to keep its Oshawa, Ontario plant open until 2012 and offers buyouts worth up to $125,000 to workers at the Windsor transmission plant, which will soon be shut down. Chrysler, for its part, agreed to continue producing minivans at its Windsor assembly site, continue producing the 300C in Brampton, Ontario and keep its Toronto casting plant open until 2011.
CAW President Buzz Hargrove calls the tentative deals "a win-win" for both the union workers and the automakers. Union workers in Canada will get the chance to vote on the contracts later this month. A GM vote is planned for Friday, May 16. Chrysler's contract vote will follow on Saturday, May 17.
[Source: Automotive News - sub. req'd]
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
why not the LS2LS7? 2:37PM (5/16/2008)
This will give Buzz plenty of opportunity to engage in destructive micro-strikes instead.
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Velvetsmack 7:26PM (5/18/2008)
I think Buzz sees the dimming light at the end of the short tunnel. He wanted to get this over quick.
cly 4:07PM (5/16/2008)
This is how Canadians do it. Canadians are more realistic and educated about the state of their economy. They know when not to fight a losing battle. It's too bad this still won't save Detroit.
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Bryan 4:15PM (5/16/2008)
Car makers don't need to pay for their health insurance. So even now that the canadian dollar is the same as USD, big3 still comes out ahead making cars there. Thats wut u get when u have a 1st world spending economy and a 3rd world health system.
why not the LS2LS7? 5:29PM (5/16/2008)
You clearly haven't listened to a word Buzz Hargrove has said for the last two years.
http://www.autoblog.com/2007/06/07/caw-union-head-buzz-hargrove-threatens-to-take-gm-down-in-08-if/
Aprime 9:57PM (5/16/2008)
And you clearly don't know Buzz.
He's a flip-flopping bullsh*t artist. :D
John 4:31PM (5/16/2008)
The title should be "Big Three Cave-In Again to the United Auto Whiners (and Canadian Auto Whiners too).
$125K to pay off people just for showing up to work (occasionally for some) when a plant closes? That is obscene.
When is this group of labor extortionists going to finally figure out their greed is nailing their own coffin shut?
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oby 4:35PM (5/16/2008)
"Car makers don't need to pay for their health insurance. So even now that the canadian dollar is the same as USD, big3 still comes out ahead making cars there. Thats wut u get when u have a 1st world spending economy and a 3rd world health system."
Have you ever been in the 3rd world? Wait don't answer that, it's obvious you have not. If you really knew what 3rd world healthcare was like, you wouldn't have made such a stupid statement. BTW, 'Canadian' is spelt with a capital C, there is an apostrophe in 'That's', the word 'what' is not spelt 'wut' nor is 'you' spelt as 'u'. Looks like you got a 3rd world education in whatever country you live in. Do you happen to work for GM by any chance?
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jamie 4:40PM (5/16/2008)
We won! We won!
And we only lost 1200 jobs.
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bakka 10:01AM (5/17/2008)
Why do so many on AB hate unions?
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John 11:48AM (5/17/2008)
I had to work with those crybabies for over 5 years. I can tell you firsthand about the laziness, greed, entitlement attitude of those people and how they live to manipulate the system and screw management at every opportunity.