They also say joint venture partners must be involved in the talks. The automakers have resisted bringing battery plants into the national UAW contracts, contending the union can’t represent workers who haven’t been hired yet. GM’s shares ended Friday up almost 2%, Stellantis added 3% and Ford rose just under 1%. Shares of all three automakers rose after Fain’s announcement in apparent anticipation that deals might be near. The plant in Lordstown employs about 1,400 people. In response, Ultium Cells’ acting president Alex Eom wrote Brown, stating there is “no viable legal or practical path” to bring the company’s employees into the national contract, and Ultium Cells is a “separate legal entity and independent employer.” Sherrod Brown, D-Ohio, called for employees at plants like Ultium Cells to be folded into a national agreement between the UAW and GM. The UAW and the company have been negotiating a first contract since January following an overwhelming 710-16 vote to join the union in December.īefore the vote on the wage agreement, a group of U.S. GM and South Korea’s LG Energy Solutions formed the joint venture Ultium Cells to mass produce EV battery cells the first plant open and manufacturing cells is in Lordstown, where employees in August approved an agreement with the company that gave raises worth 25% on average to hourly union workers. GM, Ford and Stellantis declined immediate comment on Fain’s announcement. “And I think GM is thinking they may get something in return for this on the economic items.” “GM went far beyond and gave them this,” Masters said. He said the details of GM’s offer, made in writing, will have to be scrutinized. GM battery plants would now be covered under the union’s master agreement and GM would bargain with the union, “which I think is a monumental development,” said Marick Masters, a business professor at Wayne State University in Detroit. The companies have said the plants, mostly joint ventures with South Korean battery makers, had to be bargained separately.įriday’s change means the four U.S. In addition to large general pay raises, cost-of-living pay, restoration of pensions for new hires and other items, the union wanted to represent 10 battery factories proposed by the companies. “Our strike is working, but we’re not there yet.” “Today, under the threat of a major financial hit, they leapfrogged the pack in terms of a just transition” from combustion engines to electric vehicles, he said.

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