Workers Strike GM Technical Center : Autos: 3,500 employees protest in week’s second UAW walkout. Chief issue is the use of outsiders.
About 3,500 General Motors Corp. employees went on strike Thursday in the second walkout this week at a major automotive technology center.
On Tuesday, 850 workers began a strike at Chrysler Corp. Neither walkout will affect production of current cars but could disrupt design and engineering operations.
United Auto Workers struck the centers after negotiators were unable to agree on local contracts. A chief issue is the auto makers’ use of outsiders--either contract workers or employees of GM suppliers--inside the technology centers, working alongside union members, the UAW said.
“They’re just plain doing the work,” said David Corless, secretary-treasurer of UAW Local 412, which represents striking designers, model makers and other employees at the Chrysler Technology Center in Auburn Hills, Mich.
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“The main issue is the transfer of new technology,” said Earl Hartman, first vice president of UAW Local 160, which represents the striking workers at GM’s vast technical center in Warren, Mich. “What’s happening here at the tech center is we’ve been part of the new technology . . . (and) management is transferring the work into the salaried work force and to outside contractors.”
Neither GM nor Chrysler would comment on those issues. Bargaining at GM is scheduled to resume today. No talks were scheduled for Chrysler.
Chrysler strikers make up about 12% of the 7,000 employees at its technology center.
The GM strikers are part of a 20,000-employee force at a complex that includes headquarters for the company’s North American operations and its Chevrolet and Cadillac divisions in addition to its design and research facilities.
The union said it believes the walkouts could hurt even though current car and truck production will be unaffected.
“We deal with the future product line at General Motors, so you won’t see any immediate impact in the marketplace,” Hartman said, but “our expertise in the prototype arena is every bit as important as the design and engineering.”
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U.S. auto makers have worked to reduce costs and shorten the process of developing new vehicles. One way they have done that is to involve suppliers in the early stages of planning and design. In some cases, that means supplier employees are placed in the technical centers, working with so-called platform teams.
“That’s a trend in industry worldwide,” said Dale Brickner, associate director of the School of Labor and Industrial Relations at Michigan State University.
Brickner said the conflict over the practice at GM and Chrysler is a logical outgrowth of disputes over “outsourcing,” a word coined to describe auto makers’ shift to buying components from non-union suppliers instead of using their own union workers to make them.
