Chrysler contract wins two key local votes

DETROIT -- The Chrysler-UAW pact cleared a major hurdle when two of four large Detroit area locals voting today ratified the tentative agreement, but it's still unclear if the pact will win final ratification by week's end.

Workers at Warren Truck assembly plant today approved the agreement by 78 percent. UAW Local 140 at Warren Truck represents about 2,600 workers. Also, 88 percent of production workers at Sterling Heights Stamping voted for the accord. Local 1264 represents about 1,800 workers.

Warren Truck is the first of eight Chrysler assembly plants to approve the contract. Four have turned it down. And workers at Sterling Heights Assembly Plant are voting on the agreement today as are workers at Warren Stamping. Results for those votes are not yet available.

After today, the remaining assembly plant to vote on the agreement is Belvidere, Ill. The voting results coming into today's critical ratifications were too close to call.

Leading Chrysler contract opponent Bill Parker says the UAW should return to the bargaining table and fight for future product guarantees if rank-and-file workers reject the current tentative agreement with Chrysler.

On Tuesday, 6,000 workers at Chrysler's Kokomo, Ind., transmission operations dealt another blow to chances that the UAW would ratify the tentative new master contract with Chrysler.

About 70 percent of the workers casting votes at Kokomo rejected the deal as part of a heavy turnout, the Kokomo Tribune reported. UAW Local 685 rejected the agreement by a 2,269-881 vote. UAW Local 1166 turned it down 586-165.

Buzz Hargrove, president of the Canadian Auto Workers union, which faces its own round of talks with automakers next year, said the Chrysler contract appeared headed for defeat.

"To me, it means that UAW and the companies will have to go back to the bargaining table and try to find a solution to the issues that the workers are finding most offensive," Hargrove told reporters in Ottawa.

Parker said Chrysler workers should have received new product commitments similar to those that the UAW won from General Motors last month.

Chrysler’s tentative agreement is in danger of not passing because of the failure to get those promises and other provisions that fall short of the GM contract, said Parker, president of UAW Local 1700 in Sterling Heights.

That includes Chrysler’s decision not to make temporary workers permanent; GM promised to permanently hire 3,000.

“If the agreement is defeated, the union should return to bargaining and address the issues that have led to member dissatisfaction,” Parker said Tuesday.

Parker said Chrysler workers are making sacrifices this contract with a new-hire wage, restructuring of retiree health care and factory work-rule changes. They should expect at least what GM workers received in return for similar provisions. That is, specific pledges for new products.

The UAW went on strike against GM for two days in September until it received specific investment plans to build future models beginning as far out as 2013. GM rank-and-file overwhelmingly approved the concessionary contract in October after product plans were made public.

Chrysler, on the other hand, only promised to extend vehicles through their current model plans, for the most part, not beyond 2011.

Parker is one of the few local leaders vocal in his opposition to the accord. He was the lone person on the nine-member Chrysler UAW National Negotiating Committee to vote against the plan.

Rank-and-file opposition is widespread, unorganized and largely plant-by-plant, Parker said. The workers simply are voting their interests and consciences, he said.

That contrasts with an orchestrated push by UAW leadership to get the agreement approved. Workers at Jefferson North Assembly Plant Friday rejected the contract by a wide margin despite personal lobbying by UAW President Ron Gettelfinger and UAW Chrysler Department Vice President General Holiefield.

Reuters, quoting anonymous sources, reported on Monday that Chrysler guaranteed it would keep some U.S. factories running well beyond the 2011 expiration of a proposed contract.

Holiefield told union Local 1700 leaders that the Sterling Heights assembly plant would be guaranteed production until 2016 under a previously undisclosed understanding between the union and the privately held automaker, according to a person familiar with that briefing.

Parker was not present for that meeting with Holiefield, Reuters reported.