Machinists’ Pact May Speed Jet Production
McDonnell Douglas Corp. machinists at three area plants have narrowly ratified a three-year contract, a move that will probably reduce the effect of a broad worker slowdown that has delayed delivery of at least 10 jetliners this year.
The International Assn. of Machinists’ District 720, which represents about 5,900 McDonnell Douglas workers at facilities in Torrance, Long Beach and Huntington Beach, announced a 52% approval of the new pact on Thursday. No vote tally was released, but a union spokesman said the turnout was disappointing.
The contract includes pay and pension concessions from the company and imposes health insurance fees on workers, a key issue during nearly a year of off-and-on bargaining, according to the union and the company.
Second Union Eager
A spokesman for the United Auto Workers, which represents about 10,000 employees at McDonnell Douglas’ aircraft division in Long Beach, said that union is eager to resume bargaining, which broke off in March.
“I think (the workers) want to get this thing behind them and settle down and start building airplanes without all these side issues and hoopla going on,” said Bruce Lee, director of UAW’s western region.
Lee, who has managed Lakewood-based UAW Local 148 since the international union took control in May after an abortive election of local officers, said he does not think bargaining will resume until after a new election Aug. 11.
McDonnell Douglas spokesman Don Hanson would not say whether the company plans to meet with the UAW before then.
Since October, when their contracts expired, the machinists and the UAW have cooperated in a “build it by the book” strategy under which workers have performed their duties at a slower than usual pace.
As a result, the company was 10 aircraft deliveries behind schedule by the end of April, it announced. Top officials had said it could be 55 deliveries behind by the end of 1987 if the labor disputes continued.
Production rebounded from 13 jetliners during the first quarter of the year to 31 during the second, and the company is now four planes behind schedule, Hanson said. Still, Douglas Aircraft Co. President William T. Gross said in an interview last week, continued labor unrest “could impair the long-term health of the company.”
The machinists’ vote should improve that forecast, Hanson said. “Certainly it will help to continue to improve production,” he said. Mike Smith, the machinists’ local president, said that with contract ratification, his union will abandon its by-the-book strategy, reducing the effectiveness of the UAW’s slowdown.
Smith said the strategy forced McDonnell Douglas to resume negotiations and eventually to make several concessions.
Under the new contract, machinists will receive a 3% general wage increase retroactive to October and a 2% raise the second year. The contract also includes annual lump sum payments of 2% to 4% a year based on employees’ earnings. Company machinists now earn an average of about $13 an hour.
The lump sum payments will be based on gross wages, including overtime, vacation and sick pay, and the lump sum payment from the previous year. Previously, the company had insisted on basing the lump sum only on regular wages and overtime.
Pension Increase
The contract also increases machinists’ pension benefits from $17 for each month of service to $23 and implements it on Aug. 1. The company had offered a $20-a-month increase now, raising it to $23 in October, 1989.
In addition, machinists in the top four of 17 work grades will get a 5-cent to 20-cent hourly raise, a provision not in the first company offer.
The company would not abandon its position that single employees pay $2 a week for medical insurance and married ones pay $4. A requirement that retired workers also make such payments was deleted. The contract includes a 6-cent-an-hour wage increase to partly offset the insurance payments.
IAM District 720 represents 3,560 workers at the Douglas Aircraft Co. plant in Torrance, about 100 at Douglas’ main facility in Long Beach, 2,250 at McDonnell Douglas Astronautics in Huntington Beach and about 300 in Arizona, Florida and Vandenberg Air Force Base.
