Auto Workers

Canada: National Steel Car Production Grinds To A Halt

July 11, 2023 Samantha Beattie, CBC. Resist! Auto Workers, Canada, Strikes, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

All production has stopped at Hamilton's National Steel Car as 1,450 workers continue to strike this week. Workers walked off the job on June 29 and are striking to demand higher wages and improved safety from the railcar manufacturing company, said Frank Crowder, union president of United Steelworkers Local 7135. He spoke from the picket line Tuesday morning, where dozens of workers were crowded in front of the plant's entrance gate on Kenilworth Avenue North. The smell of smoke wafted from a fire burning in an old oil drum as rock music played.

Six Weeks In, Stock Dwindles At Struck Ohio Battery Plant

June 13, 2023 Courtney Smith, Labor Notes. Resist! Auto Workers, Ohio, Strikes, Worker Rights and Jobs

Four hundred auto workers have been on strike at vehicle battery manufacturer Clarios since May 8, rejecting two tentative agreements that fell short of their demands. “We’re not asking for the moon, we just want it to be a good place to work,” said Andrew Hoertz, a machine operator, citing the company’s decision to cut the piece rates—the incentives workers get paid per battery produced. The company has pulled out all the stops to prevent any hit to battery production, from stockpiling batteries to weaken workers’ leverage at the negotiating table to shifting production out of this plant, which is near Toledo, Ohio.

Ford Parts Workers Strike Over Money, Safety, Discipline

June 3, 2023 Jane Slaughter, Labor Notes. Resist! Auto Workers, Strikes, Worker Rights and Jobs, Workplace Safety

“I wish to be like eggs,” said Abdullah Saleem, in his third week of striking Constellium Automotive west of Detroit. “You know how eggs used to be a dollar a dozen and now they’re $4,” said Saleem, who has 11 years working at the plant. Pointing to the $18.60 that’s the usual pay for a Constellium operator, Saleem wants his wage to show the same progress as eggs. Constellium, a supplier of aluminum parts and crash management systems to Ford, is refusing to budge on wages, according to bargaining committee member Mohamed Alturki. The workers’ first contract was rushed through three years ago during Covid and contained no wage increase the first year, and just two 3 percent boosts the other two years.

Three Decades Ago, There Was A Deadly Attack On Mexican Autoworkers

June 2, 2023 Isabela Escalona, Workday Magazine. Strategize! Auto Workers, History, Labor Movement, Mexico, Violence, Worker Rights and Jobs

Rob McKenzie is a writer and former auto worker at the Ford Twin Cities Assembly Plant in St. Paul, Minn., where he worked as an assembler, industrial electrician, and then as a full-time union representative for the United Auto Workers (UAW) until the plant closed in 2011. During his time as a steward at the Twin Cities plant in 1990, news hit of a deadly attack on a Ford plant in Cuautitlán, Mexico, a town just outside of Mexico City. The autoworkers in Cuautitlán were part of a radicalizing union reform movement due to their union’s management colluding with the company to undermine them.

Battery Jobs Must Be Good-Paying Union Jobs, Says New UAW President

May 19, 2023 Dan DiMaggio, Labor Notes. Organize! Auto Workers, Electric Vehicles, Just transition, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

Contracts covering 150,000 auto workers at the Big 3 will expire on September 14, and the new leadership of the United Auto Workers is taking a more aggressive stance than in years past. “We’re going to launch our biggest contract campaign ever in our history,” UAW President Shawn Fain told members in a Facebook live video. Fain took office in March after winning the union’s first one member, one vote election. Running on the slogan, “No Corruption, No Concessions, No Tiers,” he and the Members United slate swept all the positions they ran for, giving reformers a majority on the international executive board.

As Negotiations Loom, Closure Shows Automakers Using Same Playbook

April 19, 2023 Nick Livick, Labor Notes. Educate! Auto Workers, Illinois, Labor Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

On March 1, Stellantis (formerly Chrysler) “idled” the Belvidere Assembly Plant in Illinois—putting 1,350 people out of work indefinitely, with the threat hanging over them that the plant might stay closed forever. Is Stellantis hurting for money? Absolutely not. In fact, the corporation has recently had some of its best years on record. This is a clear attempt to use the plant as a cudgel, as the Big 3 automakers head into negotiations with the United Auto Workers this fall. It’s a signal that, despite record profits, the companies will remain true to their same old playbook—holding people’s livelihoods over their heads and holding communities at ransom.

Auto Workers Convention Lurches Towards Reversing Concessions

March 30, 2023 Keith Brower Brown and Jane Slaughter, Labor Notes. Organize! Auto Workers, Democracy, Labor Movement, Worker Rights and Jobs

The brand-new leaders of the United Auto Workers are making ambitious demands but face stiff organizing challenges as they seek to jump-start the union, ahead of a momentous contract expiration this September at Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis (formerly Chrysler). At the union’s Detroit convention this week, hundreds of delegates–often local leaders–signaled they were less ready than the members to welcome the reform leadership. But there was unanimity that it’s time to finally recoup the divisive contract concessions granted in the 2007-2009 recession. Under those contracts the then-ailing automakers were allowed to hire new workers at close to half pay and no pension.

UAW Reformers Clinch The Presidency

March 26, 2023 Luis Feliz Leon, Labor Notes. Organize! Auto Workers, Elections, Unions, United Auto Workers (UAW), Worker Rights and Jobs

Reform challenger Shawn Fain has won the presidency of the United Auto Workers, the federal monitor announced today. Fain will be sworn in just in time to chair the UAW's bargaining convention, which begins Monday. The vote count had begun March 1, but the initial tallies were so close that final results hinged on a few hundred challenged ballots. The painstaking process to check which ones were valid dragged on for weeks. But while members awaited the final count, Big 3 auto worker rank-and-filers inspired by the reform slate were already stepping up to run for local office and change their union. With their contracts expiring in September, there’s no time to lose. Several spoke to Labor Notes about their plans to reshape the union’s methods and goals.

Auto Workers Presidential Election A Nail-biter, Reformers Sweep Regionals

March 4, 2023 Luis Feliz Leon, Labor Notes. Organize! Auto Workers, Elections, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

In the first-ever rank-and-file direct election, as opposed to a vote of convention delegates, for the national leadership of the United Auto Workers, the presidential runoff is extremely close, with ballots still being counted. Challenges are expected no matter the outcome. At stake is the direction of the union. Presidential challenger Shawn Fain and the Members United slate have run on a platform of “No Concessions, No Corruption, No Tiers.” The slate was backed by the reform group Unite All Workers for Democracy (UAWD), which formed in 2019 to fight for members' right to vote on top officers.

Ballots Out In UAW Presidential Run-Off

January 22, 2023 Dan DiMaggio, Labor Notes. Resist! Auto Workers, Elections, Unions, United Auto Workers (UAW), Worker Rights and Jobs

The election pits challenger Shawn Fain, an electrician from Kokomo, Indiana, and an international rep, against incumbent president Ray Curry. The 400,000-member union represents workers at the Big Three auto plants, auto parts factories, and other sectors including heavy equipment manufacturing and higher education. Curry picked up 38.2 percent in the first round of voting late last year, to Fain’s 37.6 percent. Three other candidates split the rest. Since no candidate received a majority, the election went to a run-off. Fain’s Members United slate notes that 62 percent of voters picked candidates other than the incumbent. Fain has pledged to build a fighting union that will take on the big auto companies and reverse decades of concessions, while Curry has emphasized his experience in leading the union; he was appointed president by the Executive Board in 2021 after being elected secretary-treasurer in 2018.

Mexico: Battleground For Independent Union’s First Contract Fight

January 21, 2023 Luis Feliz Leon, Labor Notes. Resist! Auto Workers, Mexico, Strikes, Unions, Worker Rights and Jobs

Piedras Negras, Coahuila, Mexico - In the Mexican border city of Piedras Negras, Coahuila, auto parts workers are throwing down yet again against their employer, Michigan-based VU Manufacturing, and its chosen union, the Confederation of Mexican Workers (CTM). Last August, VU workers voted to form an independent union, the Mexican Workers’ League (la Liga), defeating management’s effort to impose an employer-friendly union affiliated with the CTM. After a union wins an election, Mexican labor law grants six months to bargain a contract. In the League’s case, the timetable runs through March 6. Bargaining a new contract usually takes about two months, say Mexican labor activists. At GM Silao, workers negotiated a new contract last May, three months after voting in a new union. But workers say VU Manufacturing has renewed its campaign to bust the independent union.

Ballots Are Out In UAW Election, With Contrasting Visions Of Unionism

October 20, 2022 Jane Slaughter and Barry Eidlin, Labor Notes. Organize! Auto Workers, UAW, Unions, United Auto Workers (UAW), Worker Rights and Jobs

Stakes are high in the United Auto Workers, with two polar-opposite visions of unionism up for leadership. On Monday ballots were sent to UAW members for the union’s first direct election of top officers. The rank-and-file vote comes about because members voted last fall to switch to that system, instead of having a far smaller number of convention delegates elect top leaders, as the UAW has done until now. The opportunity to let members decide was ordered by the U.S. Justice Department’s monitor, installed in 2021 to oversee remedies to the union’s blatant corruption. Over the past five years, more than a dozen UAW officials have pleaded guilty and gone to jail for embezzlement and other crimes, including two presidents. President Dennis Williams, for example, got the union to build him a $1.1 million lakeside “cabin” to ease his retirement.

Case New Holland Workers’ Strike Enters Fifth Month, Negotiations Stall

September 22, 2022 Mel Buer, The Real News Network. Resist! Auto Workers, Protests, Unions, Wisconsin, Worker Rights and Jobs

Racine, Wisconsin - Back in July, I took a weekend trip to Burlington, Iowa, to visit manufacturing workers at Case New Holland (CNH Industrial), who, along with their coworkers at another plant in Racine, Wisconsin, have been on strike since May 2. When I arrived, the early shift of picketers stood jovially together under the hot morning sun. Even at 10AM, the temperature was already a blistering 86 degrees, with humidity high enough that it made your clothes damp to the touch. The picketers didn’t seem to mind as they made their way slowly past the entrance to the Case New Holland plant, holding up a line of empty vans that had dropped off a shift of scab workers earlier. Workers wore “UAW 807 Solidarity” t-shirts and cracked jokes to one another as the hired security looked on from the other side of the fence, cameras at the ready.

Auto Workers Turn A Corner For Strike Pay And Democracy

August 3, 2022 Keith Brower Brown and Jane Slaughter, Labor Notes. Organize! Auto Workers, Democracy, Strike, Worker Rights and Jobs

Reformers in the Auto Workers won day one strike pay at the union’s constitutional convention in Detroit last week. They also forced open debate on the top concession that has weakened the union in the last 15 years—tiered contracts that condemn newer workers to lower pay and benefits beside “legacy” workers doing the same job. This was the first UAW convention since a leadership corruption scandal erupted, reformers won a member referendum last fall to adopt one-member-one-vote for top officers, and the auto industry began a serious transition to electric vehicles. Held every four years, the meeting has usually been a stale coronation of leaders. A newly organized reform movement turned the convention into a rowdy debate that, for moments, even overruled the top union leaders.

UAW Delegates Head To Convention And Prepare For First Direct Elections

July 20, 2022 Jonah Furman, Labor Notes. Organize! Auto Workers, Democracy, UAW, United Auto Workers (UAW), Worker Rights and Jobs

Auto Workers (UAW) members made history last November, winning direct elections of national officers (“one member, one vote”) in a membership referendum. Now delegates are headed to a Constitutional Convention where candidates will be nominated for the top slots. The whole process will put to the test whether reformers can break the iron grip of the Administration Caucus, the one party that has ruled the union for 70 years. Winning direct elections was the first hurdle. The next, formidable hurdles are: Will a credible slate of challengers form? Will a majority of members vote for change? And can new leaders and constitutional changes turn things around for the UAW? The election will cover 14 positions: president, secretary-treasurer, three vice presidents (traditionally assigned to each of the Big Three automakers: General Motors, Ford, and Stellantis, formerly Chrysler), plus nine regional directors.

«1 2 3 4 5 6 »

assetto corsa mods

Daily movement news and resources