UAW gives GM Sunday night deadline on US labor contract

Contract talks between General Motors and the United Auto Workers union continued Sunday just hours before a midnight deadline for a possible strike.

“We support our colleagues in the skilled trades as they move toward formal recognition of their unit”, he said in a statement.

Mike Cantrell, president of Local 42, said a key objective for the union has been moving toward collective bargaining for the goal of reaching a multi-year contract between VW and its Chattanooga employees.

They could get a proposed tentative agreement, they could extend the deadline, they could walk out and go on strike, or the company could lock them out.

The Lake Orion plant produces small subcompact cars-the Buick Verano and the Chevrolet Sonic.

Workers at the Lordstown plant remain on the job as of Sunday afternoon and early Sunday evening. GM does not have a similar shift in its plants.

The last GM strike was in 2007 and only lasted two days.

“Pattern bargaining serves an important goal: It levels the playing field so companies compete based on the quality of their products or services – not on how much they pay (or don’t pay) their workers”, the union said on its Facebook page. This would presumably apply to workers brought in to produce the Volt.

July: UAW officially begin contract talks with Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, General Motors and Ford. GM’s financial success adds pressure on UAW leaders to strike a good deal or face the risk that any proposed contract will be rejected by rank-and-file members. Chrysler and GM both ended up in bankruptcy court in 2009.

Maintenance employees keep up and fix the specialized plant equipment.

UAW President Dennis Williams previously has said that a strike would be a bargaining failure.

GM and the other auto companies have succeeded in slashing per-vehicle production costs by half over the past decade.

The organization said it “will continue its work in cooperation with management to achieve employee’s primary goal of establishing a local works council”. Health care is an big issue at GM which has about 400,000 retirees compared with about 100,000 at FCA so there could be changes to the pattern in this areas.

As a result, profits have soared. The company overcame $1.5 billion in costs from recalls over deadly ignition switches and beat Wall Street profit forecasts by a wide margin.