By Jane Slaughter
Oct. 11, 2011
Early results of voting on the new Ford-United Auto Workers contract are nearly break-even, according to Detroit newspapers. Reformers in the union are organizing to get the 41,000 Ford workers to once again vote “no” on their national contract, as they did in October 2009.
Wisconsin: Now is the time to escalate the struggle for labor and a just economy/ Photo Mark Brennan Labor Notes
UAW reformers point out that the contract would freeze wages and substitute bonuses—which wouldn’t recover the losses from years of concessions—and it would permanently institutionalizes the two-tier wage system. Despite raises for the lower tier, it provides no bridge to higher wages.
With 7.3 percent of votes reported, production workers have voted “yes” by 50.1 percent and skilled trades “no” by 54.8 percent. Local 900, covering a Focus assembly plant west of Detroit where the shop chair opposed the agreement because of onerous “alternative work schedules,” voted “no” by 56 votes.
The Autoworkers Caravan group is circulating a leaflet asking workers to vote no. It says, “Ford is rolling in profits and Wall Street is tickled to see this contract.”
Labor Notes Conference 2008
Local 900 member Dave Dogonski described himself as a fence-sitter who had voted yes. “I would like to have voted no in order to make a political statement,” he said. “How can the union in one breath support things like Occupy Wall Street but at the same time let the corporations take windfall profits and not get us a raise?”
Ford is currently the richest of the Detroit 3, and the only company where workers have the right to strike. UAW President Bob King negotiated a package that is richer monetarily than the one ratified by GM workers last month. They will receive signing bonuses of $6,000 rather than $5,000 and annual bonuses of $1,500 rather than $1,000.
Judy Wraight, an instrument repairperson at Ford’s ancient Rouge complex near Detroit, pointed out that $1,500 is the monetary equivalent of just three of the concessions workers made in 2009 (one holiday, less daily break time, and a Christmas bonus). Two other concessions—a wage freeze in place since 2005 and the 99 cents-per-hour wage cut workers took when they gave up the cost-of-living allowance—were not addressed.
Auto company execs are clear that they want to shift workers to half wages—permanently.
GM CEO Dan Akerson and UAW President Bob King
GM CEO Dan Akerson said recently that although “we don’t need to get there tomorrow,” his aim is to replace higher-paid workers with those now starting at $15.78, partly through buyouts of senior workers and skilled trades.
But the contracts contain no pension increases, for the first time, and they take away the small Christmas bonus most retirees had received.
The UAW says that Ford will invest to create new jobs, but the reformers counter: “What does the record tell us about promises like that? Ford will invest in what it thinks is profitable. Every contract for decades has been presented as a ‘job security contract,’ but UAW-Ford has lost half its membership since 1999.”
For more rank-and-file leaflets about the Ford and GM contracts, see Soldiers of Solidarity and Factory Rat.
http://labornotes.org/blogs/2011/10/uaw-ford-workers-organizing-no-vote
From Ron Lare
One independent brother is making vote count reports like this one for today, starting with Local 900:
http://www.xpdnc.com/files/relatednewsandreports11/UAWFord2011-LocalVote-October11.pdf
His general contract information site is:
http://www.xpdnc.com/files/relatednewsandreports11/
Latest Local 600 version of Autoworker Caravan leaflet is below this message–names have been added.
4. Another Autoworker Caravan leaflet is at:
http://www.autoworkercaravan.org/Pdf/AWC_Ford_Lowlights_v2.pdf
Our web site is at:
http://www.600alert.org/index.php
Judy Wraight, Ron Lare, 313-492-7657
Do they think we forgot why we voted NO in 2009?
Vote NO!
Ford is rolling in profits and Wall Street is tickled to see this contract. But we don’t even get the concessions back–from COLA, to Annual Improvement Factor, to Easter Monday. Retirees lose the Christmas bonus and the legal services plan is being phased out—read on and find out more. We voted NO in 2009 to preserve the right to strike, but you wouldn’t know it from this contract.
COLA is gone forever if we can’t restore it now, when Ford is making big profits. Bloomberg News quotes Bob King: “Would [the members] like fixed rate increases? Sure they would. I’d like to give it to them, but they know the competitive structure as well as I do.”
UAW and Ford at the bargaining table
A lump sum is not a Cost of Living Allowance keyed to inflation. King’s words ”fixed rate increases” mean increases in the base hourly rate, like the 3% Annual Improvement Factor and COLA that we lost. Scott Houldieson of Chicago Assembly has a good comeback for President King: “Frozen COLA and second tier wage increased to full wage combined would have reduced profits for 2010 to a mere $6.41 billion dollars! How is a company to survive on that?!” A 4% wage increase for the first year of the contract would amount to $95.5 million–less than the stock awarded to Mulally and Bill Ford in 2011. What a time to eliminate Equity of Sacrifice from the “Unpublished Letters”!
Second tier comes up only to average NON-union industrial pay. Ford needed this anyway to get workforce stability. If we sell out our children, they won’t defend our pensions. They only get 13 weeks SUB. UNITY = Equal Pay for Equal Work, not second class citizenship. Brother Houldieson also wrote: “Forget all the happy talk about the FTPM Morale Matrix. The company knows it has a better chance of controlling us if they can keep us divided.” Gary Walkowicz of Dearborn Truck wrote: “The biggest concession is that 2-tier will continue.” Do you believe any 2nd tier will become 1st tier with this contract?
If Ford hires permanent 2nd tier workers, the contract contains loopholes that let them hire way more than the so-called 20% cap–including some whole plants that are 2nd-tier only. Either way, everyone is undermined by non-equal pay for equal work. Will Ford even hire true 2nd tier? Last time we checked, all but 100 nation-wide were LTSs, not permanent 2nd tier. We have a three tier membership. Why is insourced work not counted toward the 20% cap on entry level numbers?
Pensions: New low for the UAW: No increase. Retirees lost their Christmas bonus.
• VEBA: Health care is still inadequately funded. New VEBA funds come only from the profit-sharing gamble. 30 & Out means little–if you’re afraid to retire before Medicare!
“Manufacturing Work Groups” combine production and skilled trades. This undermines trades classifications and undermines production workers’ chances of real advancement through apprenticeships.
• Overtime: Time and a half after 8 hours is not restored. Increasing Alternative Work Schedules are designed to eliminate overtime pay as much as possible. We should make enough to not need overtime.
• Without real barriers to outsourcing, the outsourcing will continue and increase. “Sourcing moratorium remains intact,” say the Highlights. But we see outsourcing all the time.
Working conditions: Lost break time is not restored. Alternative Work Schedules undermine working lives and family lives.
The 2011 UAW Bargaining Convention endorsed domestic partner same-sex bereavement pay, but it’s not in this contract.
We need a contract that helps organize the unorganized at Toyota, VW, Honda, Mercedes. Non-union workers need to see us as a fighting union. There has been no national Ford strike since 1976!
ACH workers should simply be made full Ford workers now—rather than waiting for openings.
What’s the alternative to voting Yes? Vote No–send them back to the table to get what we deserve. And show Ford some real strike preparation.
“Creating” and “saving” jobs?? What does the record tell us about promises like that? Ford will invest in what it thinks is profitable. The contract will not force Ford to add jobs if business conditions are not good and we don’t have a fighting union. Every contract for decades has been presented as a “job security contract,” but UAW-Ford has lost half its membership since 1999. Now Twin Cities MN and Walton Hills OH plants will close. And as the Autoworker Caravan wrote about the GM contract: “Shifting work from one plant to another isn’t ‘new’ work. Laying off autoworkers in Mexico is not ‘creating jobs’. Talk about new work, why didn’t the Union challenge the corporations to make fuel-efficient buses that every U.S. city could purchase?”
See more Vote No leaflets and analysis at:
www.autoworkercaravan.org, www.soldiersofsolidarity.com, www.factoryrat.com
Contact Autoworker Caravan: autoworkercaravan@gmail.com. IN LOCAL 600 contact:
Gary Walkowicz, 313-737-3166, gwalk32@att.net; Judy Wraight, 313-272-0307, jswraight@aol.com; TO ADD YOUR NAME TO NEXT EDITION OF THIS LEAFLET, WRITE OR CALL:
Ron Lare, 600 ret., ronlare@sbcglobal.net, 313-492-7657
Gary Walkowicz Judy Wraight Ron Lare, ret. Keith Hall
Shontelle Paul Thelma Phillips Michelle Robinson Jim Herbst
Ron Matley, ret. Doug Kowalske, ret. Eric Truss Steve Longstreet
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