#Uaw

As members of the media swarm over new vehicles in Los Angeles, a legal drama is playing out in Detroit. General Motors has filed a federal racketeering lawsuit against cross-town rival Fiat Chrysler, alleging FCA conspired to undermine the collective bargaining process and create unfair advantages by bribing UAW officials.

This cost GM lots of money, the automaker claims, and now it wants to collect.

“This lawsuit is intended to hold FCA accountable for the harm its actions have caused our company and to ensure a level playing field going forward,” said Craig Glidden, GM Executive Vice President and General Counsel, in a statement.

After UAW-affiliated Ford workers ratified a collective agreement Friday, Fiat Chrysler is next — and last — in line to hammer out a deal with the union. Ford has an easy go of it, requiring just five days of bargaining before reaching a tentative deal; earlier, General Motors suffered financial hardship after its U.S. workforce walked off the job for 40 days.

Being first at the table, GM’s bargaining is seen as the heaviest lifting of the Detroit Three. Its deal serves as a model for others to follow, and you can be sure the wage increases, pathways to full-time employment, and status-quo healthcare benefits contained within will be held up by UAW bargaining team members when they face the FCA team.

However, for FCA, the nature of the automaker’s workforce could make reaching a deal a rocky journey.

Avoiding the six-week strike that marked the end of contract negotiations between the UAW and General Motors, unionized workers at Ford ratified a four-year labor deal on Friday by a fairly narrow margin.

Roughly 55,000 UAW-affiliated Ford workers voted 56.3 percent in favor of the new deal, which carries many of the benefits secured through the earlier GM contract. It’s on to Fiat Chrysler after this.

They’re not calling it that, but we are. The United Auto Workers, rocked by scandal and indictments stemming from an ongoing federal corruption probe, is embarking on a serious clean-up operation in a bid to maintain its autonomy.

Under the direction of Acting President Rory Gamble, the union has outlined a series of reforms intended to keep the federal government from stepping in and grabbing the tiller.

At this point, ensuring basic adherence to the law among his executives would suffice. Acting UAW President Rory Gamble, who took on the role after President Gary Jones stepped aside on Saturday amid mounting scrutiny over potential illegality, claims he’s sure there are no bad apples among the union’s executive board.

That said, he plans to root out any form of the illegal behaviour that, so far, has seen 13 UAW or automaker officials charged with fraud, embezzlement, and conspiracy in an ongoing federal probe. In the wake of charges laid against former UAW Vice President Joe Ashton this morning, Gamble is donning the title of Mr. Clean.

Federal prosecutors aren’t letting up on their ongoing investigation into bribery, corruption, and embezzlement in the high offices of the United Auto Workers, with former vice president Joe Ashton becoming the 13th official charged in the scandal.

On Wednesday, prosecutors charged Ashton, who retired in 2014, with wire fraud and money laundering in a wide-ranging conspiracy that saw officials demand bribes and kickbacks in exchange for contracts to certain vendors. With this latest development, Ashton becomes the highest-ranking official to land in the legal hot seat.

It might not be a position he holds for long.

With UAW President Gary Jones taking a leave of absence during a broadening corruption probe into the union, acting head Rory Gamble is attempting to reassure members that there’ll be no more funny business.

“I know recent events concerning members of our leadership have disappointed and angered many of you. I am angry as well, but I am not here to pre-judge anyone. I am here to take this union forward,” he wrote in a letter.

The message, published Tuesday, saw Gamble take a firm stance on corruption and a slightly softer one regarding previously accused (or convicted) union leaders.

UAW-affiliated Ford workers will vote by week’s end to ratify their union’s tentative four-year agreement with Ford Motor Company, or choose to kick it back in their faces and ask for something better. The General Motors contract, recently ratified, was a fairly close thing.

While bonuses, pay, and healthcare costs might be top of mind for most Ford employees, product is what concerns us here. Thankfully, leaked copies of the tentative agreement have emerged, providing a look at what vehicles we can expect Ford to build, and where.

For Michigan’s Flat Rock Assembly, it seems the near future won’t be as exciting as initially thought.

German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced Sunday that her country will soon have one million charging stations ready for electric cars. Her words came ahead of numerous meetings with German automotive manufacturers on how best to spur EV adoption in Europe.

Pivoting to zero-emission vehicles has many worried about job losses. The United Auto Workers issued a nearly 40-page report on the implications of electric vehicles and how to address them during its negotiations with General Motors — after the automaker said the battery plant it was eyeballing in Ohio would require hourly employees to take pay cuts. The Center for Automotive Research has also indicated that EVs simply don’t take as many man hours to manufacture. It’s even mentioned in the Trump administration’s fuel economy rollback proposal — an effort bent on furnishing cheap automobiles and American jobs.

Germany is worried too, with groups echoing similar employment concerns. To mitigate those fears, while encouraging electrification and maintaining jobs, the nation wants to take its 20,000 charging stations to 1 million.

Hot on the heels of charges laid against his top aide, UAW President Gary Jones has taken a leave of absence, the union stated Saturday morning.

Two days ago, federal prosecutors charged UAW official Edward Robinson with conspiracy and fraud in an embezzlement scheme alleged to involve a number of top union execs. Sources who spoke to several media outlets this week fingered Jones as the “UAW Official A” mentioned in court documents.

Jones, who was nearly invisible in the ongoing contract talks between Detroit Three automakers and UAW bargaining teams, is alleged to have shared in the spoils of a nearly decade-long scheme that saw $1.5 million in union dues funnelled into executives’ pockets.

It’s hard to keep up with the indictments stemming from the federal probe into corruption within the upper ranks of the United Auto Workers, but the trail keeps leading to one place: the top.

Numerous media sources claim UAW President Gary Jones, whose home was raided by FBI agents in August, is a key figure in an embezzlement scheme outlined in documents filed this week in a Detroit federal court. Jone’s top aide, Edward Robinson, stands charged with conspiracy and fraud, with prosecutors claiming he and others funnelled $1.5 million out of UAW coffers over a nine-year span.

You probably won’t see striking workers outside Ford Motor Company plants in the near future, all thanks to a tentative four-year labor contract reached between the automaker and the United Auto Workers late Thursday night. With General Motors leading the way in the latest round of Detroit Three bargaining, Ford worked quickly to seal a deal that likely incorporates many planks found in the now-ratified GM agreement.

While the automaker and union haven’t released details of the proposed contract, sources claim an engine plant will have to close up shop. Shuttering one parts plant won’t do much to save Ford much cash, but at least it allows the automaker to (tentatively) avoid the kind of strike that just cost its Detroit rival over $2 billion.

The longest General Motors strike in half a century came to an end late Friday as production workers and skilled trades employees voted in favor of a contract agreement forged between the automaker and the UAW last week.

GM assembly lines should be back up and running soon, but the end of this labor dispute only serves to throw the ball into Fiat Chrysler and Ford’s court. They’re next in line to head to the bargaining table.

Today is the last day of voting for UAW members employed at General Motors plants. By day’s end, we’ll know whether the rank and file saw fit to ratify the tentative agreement signed last week, thus ending the now 40-day-long strike, or send their bargaining team back to the table in search of a better deal.

So far, the membership hasn’t proven particularly enthusiastic, especially those employed at GMCH parts plants.

Voting is ongoing among UAW locals this week as the union attempts to put a contract deal in place between its members and General Motors.

Thus far, the voting process has been met with mixed emotions, with one assembly plant opting to reject the proposal. Outside that plant, the ongoing GM strike was marred by the death of a picketing plant worker.