LABOR : Teamsters Threaten Strike Against Ryder System Inc.
The Teamsters union said Wednesday its members would walk off their jobs today at Ryder System Inc., the country’s largest shipper of new automobiles, after working without a contract for 3 1/2 months.
A strike by about 5,000 Teamster drivers and dock workers, scheduled for 6 a.m. EDT today, could shut down Ryder’s three automobile hauling operations, which control about a third of the car hauling business in the country and have large contracts with General Motors Corp.
The Teamsters issued the strike threat Tuesday, claiming that Ryder and other car hauling operators had failed to provide the union with information it says it needs for bargaining.
“They have not come back with a last-minute offer, so they are looking down the barrel of a strike at 6 a.m. tomorrow,” union spokesman Craig Merrilees said late Wednesday.
About 12,000 Teamster members, who haul new automobiles to dealerships from factories and ports, are covered under a master agreement with 29 companies, including Ryder, that expired on May 21. Contract negotiations have been going on intermittently since then.
“This is going to hit General Motors particularly hard,” Merrilees said. “About 60% of Ryder’s business is with GM.” Ryder’s second-largest customer is Chrysler Corp., and Ford Motor Co. is the third largest.
Sam Wang, spokesman for the National Automobile Transporters Labor Division, which represents the employers in contract negotiations, said the other companies have decided not to lock out their union workers if Ryder is struck.
A key issue in the negotiations has been the practice of so-called “double breasting” in which the companies use non-union subsidiaries to handle some of their car-hauling business.
Union officials view the practice as a threat to the job security of their members. They estimate that Teamster haulers deliver 90% of the cars in the country.
By threatening a strike over the employers’ alleged failure to provide information to which it claims a legal right, the union could claim its members are protected against being permanently replaced by Ryder since they would be striking over an alleged unfair labor practice.
Merrilees said the union needs the information to “assess the validity of claims made by the companies concerning profitability and competition from non-union sources as well as their ownership and control of non-union subsidiaries.”
Teamster members have already voted to authorize their leaders to call a strike if necessary and overwhelmingly rejected what the companies called their final offer in July.
