How the UAW’s gains could handcuff Unifor-Detroit 3 bargaining in 2020

TORONTO -- New UAW contracts with the Detroit 3 appear to make things more difficult for Unifor in its attempts to secure long-term investments and production at Canadian plants in 2020. 

The UAW deal with General Motors, which was ratified following a 40-day strike in the United States, includes several provisions Unifor is likely to model in 2020 talks with GM, including a shortening of the 10-year pay grid and bonuses for workers. 

“But it didn’t move the needle at all on job security,” said Kristin Dziczek, vice-president of industry, labor and economics at the Center for Automotive Research. “That’s a huge deal for GM and what remains at Oshawa.” 

Contracts between the UAW and the Detroit Three in large part set the stage for Unifor negotiations the following year. They can foreshadow which areas automakers might be willing to concede ground to the union and those they will not. 

They also can limit production options for plants, should Unifor seek additional product mandates from automakers. Committing, say, $6 billion to plants in the United States as Ford Motor Co. did in its negotiations with the UAW will limits options for Unifor should it seek additional production mandates at Ford’s Oakville assembly plant. 

Ford and the UAW reached a tentative agreement in the days following the ratification of the GM-UAW contract and workers ratified the deal not long after. Negotiations between the UAW and Fiat Chrysler are ongoing. 

Negotiations between Unifor and the Detroit 3 were set to begin next year ahead of the current contracts expiring in September 2020. Here is a look at what’s at stake for each automaker and the more than 17,000 hourly workers at their Canadian assembly plants. 

FORD: 

Unifor-Ford negotiations will likely center around the future of the Oakville plant, which will have shed about 650 jobs, or about 14 percent of its work force, by early 2020. The job losses come as production of the Ford Flex and Lincoln MKT crossovers end, leaving the plant with the Ford Edge and Lincoln Nautilus crossovers. 

Unifor President Jerry Dias said the union would seek clarity from Ford on its long-term plans for the plant ahead of negotiations as the union seeks investments there to get laid-off members back to work. He said the union was willing to work with the automaker on retirement incentives for senior members as part of a solution. 

“We have some senior people at the plant that we need to talk to Ford about ways of maybe trying to entice our senior members to retire while preserving jobs for our most junior,” he said. 

Negotiations will also cover the automaker’s Windsor engine operations, where Ford committed $600 million during 2016 bargaining. Ford in May said it would cut one of three shifts at one of the engine plants due to falling demand for the 5.0-liter engines it makes, though affected workers had the opportunity to move to the Windsor engine plant that builds 7.3-liter engines. 

FIAT CHRYSLER: 

Like 2016 negotiations, 2020 talks could hinge in large part on the future of FCA’s Brampton assembly plant. The factory builds the Dodge Charger, Dodge Challenger and Chrysler 300, the latter of which is on the chopping block in the coming years, according to Joe McCabe, CEO of AutoForecast Solutions LLC. The Charger and Challenger, while profitable for FCA, sit on aging platforms, and it was unclear what the automaker’s long-term plans were for the cars. 

“We have no other product there other than the Charger and Challenger,” he said. “If they do decide to get out of that business, which we don’t think they will, then obviously Brampton will be in the crosshairs.” 

He said the plant could become an option in the long term for a new electric vehicle based on the Charger or Challenger, similar to Ford’s plans to launch an EV based on its Mustang. 

FCA’s Windsor plant will also receive attention. FCA plans to cut one of three shifts next year at the plant amid slowing North American demand for the minivans it builds. Unifor has had discussions with FCA and the federal government about ways to prevent 1,500 workers from being laid off, including a potential work-sharing program. 

Unifor Local 444 said Nov. 13 it had been notified by the company that the third shift will be extended until the end of the first quarter of 2020. That gives Unifor more time to find a solution, though FCA has said it still plans to end the shift. 

“We just don’t see the necessity of maintaining the three shifts there in the long term,” McCabe said. 

GENERAL MOTORS:

Unifor will bargain on behalf of much fewer GM Canada workers in 2020 than it did in 2016. Vehicle assembly at GM’s Oshawa factory will stop by the end of 2019, leaving only about 300 workers there when the plant becomes an aftermarket parts and stamping operation in 2020. 

Discussions with GM are sure to focus in large part on the Oshawa plant, especially after Unifor’s high-profile campaign against the automaker in the wake of the 2018 decision to end production there. Unifor is likely to seek new product mandates at the plant in the hopes of raising the number of workers, as Dias has said he expects that figure to rise over time. 

Negotiations, as usual, will also cover workers at the St. Catharines propulsion plant and GM’s Woodstock parts distribution center. They do not cover workers at GM’s CAMI factory in Ingersoll, Ont., which is on a separate contract that lasts until 2021. 

Dziczek said that could change. 

“If [Dias] wanted to move them onto the same agreement, I think he could,” she said. “It wouldn’t be that hard.” 

Much like GM and the UAW, there appeared to be little love lost between Unifor and GM. CAMI was the site of a monthlong strike in 2017, when Unifor demanded that the plant become the lead producer for the Chevrolet Equinox crossover after some production was shifted to Mexico. GM, in response, threatened to close the plant, and Unifor shortly thereafter agreed to a deal without lead producer language.