Once again, we’re looking at a “historic” agreement between Detroit carmakers and their unions that’s not what it appears to be. In other words, window dressing. The Detroit Free Press gives us the skinny on the accord between the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) and The Presidential Task Force on Automobiles—sorry, “Chrysler management.” And the bottom line is that the CAW is giving up its usual bupkis in exchange for the usual “get out of blame free” card re: the company’s evolution into extinction. “Among the benefits the CAW is giving up are a semi-private hospital room coverage, a $3,500 vacation buyout, tuition reimbursement and employee discounts to buy Chrysler vehicles. There are no immediate cuts to the union’s base wage or pension benefits. But Lewenza did agree to significant work rule changes, including reducing break times for meals and bathroom trips to 40 minutes per shift. Regarding the health care trust fund, Lewenza said there was much work still to do and he did not say when it would be implemented.”
And now, a word from the “whatever is is” department . . .
Acknowledging the April 30 deadline facing Chrysler, Fiat, banks and the UAW in the U.S. to complete a deal or see Chrysler file bankruptcy, Lewenza said, “I encourage those stakeholders to make whatever compromises are neccesary to avoid bankruptcy. We did what we could.”
Again this so called agreement is just so much Smoke and not much else, window dressing for sure as the CAW did not change base wages or contributions to their Pension plan, its like before the second World War when the then British Prime Minister declared “Peace in our Time” with Germany and we all know where that ended up eh?
Lucky me the I’m just out of camera range,in that photo.
Just so we all know, the $3500 vacation payout
was part of the last concession package we signed.
Of course not. The CAW has Chrysler bent over.
Long term, Chrysler needs to get out of Canada.
@ Geo.. Contributions to the pension?I can remember at least five contracts when we were told
“were gonn’a divert x number of cents per hour to your pension fund”.This $70 an hour figure the press loves to throw around,that includes our pension contribution.
Keep this in mind Geo,when you are under a defined pension plan,as we were,your RRSP plan[Canadian for 401K]anyway your max per year is greatly reduced for those covered under a defined benifit.
There will be plenty of vacation time for all in a week or so. Once again the phrase “we all go down together ” comes to mind.
The workers are again supposed to believe there is a big bag of gold coins under the desk of management and they are too greedy to share.
What the union should be doing is pushing for retraining options and money to pay for workers to go to technical schools or other institutions so they can learn new skills. This can be a writeoff for the company and also pave the way to reducing the workforce.
But no, it’s once again window dressing time.
Another reason I’m glad I bought a Honda last fall that was even built in Canada.
Let’s hope that with the forthcoming GM bankruptcy and Chrysler disappearing, the leaders of Honda and Toyota continue to pump out quality vehicles with excellent reliability.
Once again, worker and management greed overturns common sense. I would adjust my way of living for a $20 dollar an hour wage if it would salvage the company from not going away. What is wrong with all of the bozos? It’s simple math. Sure, reduce that meal/pee break. That’ll help.
Once again Union=Fail. Well, Chrysler=Fail for letting the union get away with this BS. “we did what we could” I’m still laughing. That’s OK, they’ll all be wondering what happened when they are in the soup line, wishing they had ACTUALLY done what they could. $7 an hour is going to look GOOD to them in a few weeks!
Quote golf4me: “$7 an hour is going to look GOOD to them in a few weeks!”
Why would $7/hour look good? Minimum wage in Ontario is $9.50/hour.
Quote JWFisher. “The CAW has Chrysler bent over.
Long term, Chrysler needs to get out of Canada.”
I agree with the Americans calling for Chrysler get out of Canada, yes please go, I would prefer your (US) tax dollars fund the Chrysler basket case, and not mine (Canada).
I had hopes that Fiat would just wash their hands of this, but unfortunately it looks like not only do they get Chrysler for free (this is not a merger), the will actually get Billions from the various governments as well.
I can see US taxpayers getting hosed yet again. Jaysus. But my ’06 Dakata keeps plugging along…