UAW talks degrade as deadline nears
“The proposal Ford offered us is garbage,” said Nicholas Brooks, a member of UAW Local 862 at Ford’s Kentucky Truck Plant. “I can’t believe they want to cut some of our profit sharing, cut the sign-on bonus down, and they definitely need to be helping the retirees more.”
Art Wheaton, a professor and labor expert at Cornell University, said Ford’s proposal doesn’t stack up to deals recently signed outside the auto industry, such as the Teamsters’ new contract with UPS.
“It may be better by historical standards, but I don’t think Shawn Fain is wrong saying it’s not an adequate proposal,” he said. “It’s a reasonable offer, it’s not a good offer.”
Officials from GM and Stellantis said they were taken aback by the union filing charges of unfair labor practices against the companies.
“This is a claim with no basis in fact, and we are disappointed to learn that Mr. Fain is more focused on filing frivolous legal charges than on actual bargaining,” Stellantis said in a statement. “We will vigorously defend this charge when the time comes, but right now we are more focused on continuing to bargain in good faith for a new agreement.”
“We are surprised by and strongly refute the NLRB charge filed by the International UAW,” GM said in a statement attributed to Gerald Johnson, executive vice president, global manufacturing. “We believe it has no merit and is an insult to the bargaining committees.
Our goal remains the same — to achieve an agreement without a disruption that rewards our team members and protects the future of the entire GM team.”
