#UnitedAutoWorkers

United Auto Workers at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles facilities will vote next week on a newly proposed contract to cover 40,000 workers, the Wall Street Journal reported.

Workers will have until Oct. 20 to review the proposed deal, which was reached last week before a threatened strike. According to the report, workers will vote on the deal Oct. 20-21. Roughly 65 percent of workers reportedly voted down the first deal between the automaker and the UAW because of concerns over its tiered pay structure, health care co-op and lack of communication from union leadership.

Bloomberg reported (via Automotive News) Thursday that a proposed contract brokered Wednesday night between the United Auto Workers and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles would raise Tier 2 workers’ pay to $29 per hour, up from $25 per hour, after an eight-year, “grow-in” period.

The separation between the two classifications of union employees — veteran Tier 1 and more recently hired Tier 2 — was a major point of contention for the workers, who voted down the proposed contract last week by a margin of nearly 2-to-1.

Roughly 40 percent of FCA’s union employees are Tier 2 workers, a much higher proportion than General Motors and Ford. On average, those employees are paid $9 to $12 less per hour less than workers hired before the recession. The proposed contract, according to the report, would not eliminate the tiered system, but instead bring closer the two pay scales. The contract also wouldn’t cap the number of Tier 2 workers hired by the automaker.

On Wednesday night, as the deadline for strike action came closer and closer, the United Auto Workers-Fiat Chrysler Automobiles National Bargaining Committee announced they had “secured significant gains” over the last proposed tentative agreement that was widely rejected by UAW membership.

Details on the new agreement were not published.

The new proposed agreement averts a strike — for now — and will be sent Friday to local union leaders that comprise the UAW National Chrysler Council for discussion and voting.

“We heard from our members, and went back to FCA to strengthen their contract,” said UAW President Dennis Williams early Thursday morning in a statement. “We’ve reached a proposed Tentative Agreement that I believe addresses our members’ principal concerns about their jobs and their futures. We have made real gains and I look forward to a full discussion of the terms with our membership.”

FCA acknowledged they reached a new proposed tentative agreement with the union, but declined to give specifics due to the pending vote by UAW members.

Negotiators for the United Auto Workers and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles are working to avoid a strike as a deadline looms Wednesday for 40,000 workers at the automaker’s plants.

Reuters reported (via Automotive News) that talks were ongoing to move forward or present a new four-year contract to workers after hourly employees roundly rejected the last proposed deal. The Detroit Free Press reported that employees voiced displeasure with the “alternative work schedules” in the contract that would keep workers on four, 10-hour shifts instead of five, 8-hour shifts, sometimes switching between late night and early morning shifts within days.

The last strike at Chrysler plants lasted for only 6.5 hours in 2007.

United Auto Workers at a Kokomo, Indiana plant have given notice to Fiat Chrysler Automobiles that it would strike Wednesday night, Automotive News reported. The notice is reportedly being used at other plants.

The automaker acknowledged the notification via a statement released Tuesday:

FCA US confirms that it has received strike notification from the UAW. The Company continues to work with the UAW in a constructive manner to reach a new agreement.

A late-night deal reached between Ford and Kansas City, Missouri auto workers averted a strike over the weekend.

United Auto Workers Vice President Jimmy Settles in a letter to workers said negotiators reached an agreement late Friday night.

As you know, earlier this week, I gave Ford Motor Company 120-hour notice of our intention to strike at the Kansas City facility if a tentative agreement for their local contract could not be reached. Thankfully, with this evenings (sic) announcement, that action has been averted.

The UAW hasn’t yet announced if it will shift its focus to negotiations with Ford after a majority of Fiat Chrysler Automobiles union workers rejected their proposed deal with the automaker.

United Auto Workers at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles officially rejected a proposed contract that would have raised wages for workers, but didn’t eliminate the tiered pay system for veteran and newly hired workers.

Reuters reported that 65 percent of the 40,000 union workers voted against the contract. Reports said that workers voiced concerns that the contract didn’t raise wages enough; created a lower-paid, “third” tier for parts and axle operations workers; and few details were provided for the health care co-op.

FCA relies heaviest among domestic automakers on lower-paid Tier 2 workers. Approximately 45 percent of hourly workers at FCA plants are Tier 2 workers.

United Auto Workers at the Kansas City, Missouri plant that produces Ford F-150s may strike as early as Sunday if the automaker doesn’t “negotiate in good faith,” according to Jimmy Settles, UAW vice president:

The challenges we face may not be easy, and I certainly cannot predict the future, but I would rather die fighting than to do an injustice to this membership or our institution.

Settles wrote to union members that issues such as “manpower provisions, the national heat stress program, and skilled trades scheduling amongst others” prompted the threatened strike at the Kansas City plant.

… it’s probably dead.

The Detroit Free Press reported that the deal appears to be mathematically impossible after several large locals voted down the proposed contract this week.

The margins of defeat have been growing since Mopar and axle operators workers voted down the proposal by just over 50 percent and 65 percent last week, according to reports. Workers in Toledo, which builds the Jeep Wrangler and may lose the Cherokee to Sterling Heights, Michigan in order to build more Wranglers, voted overwhelmingly against the proposal; 87 percent declined the contract according to the Free Press.

Union workers at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles plants say that the contract, which does not specify production sites or moving plans — such as shifting truck and car production — doesn’t assuage concerns that more jobs will be lost to Mexico.

United Auto Workers at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles’ Jefferson North Assembly Plant and its Kokomo Transmission Plant voted down a contract proposal over the weekend, marking the latest and perhaps the most significant defeat to the union’s proposal, the Detroit Free Press reported.

According to reports, 66 percent of the workers, who build Jeep Grand Cherokees and Dodge Durangos at the Jefferson facility, vetoed the contract.

The contract faces an uncertain future with the rest of UAW workers at FCA, and while overall passage is mathematically possible, the growing rate of rejection doesn’t look particularly promising.

Detroit parts and axle operations workers Wednesday voted against a four-year contract proposed by the United Auto Workers and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles, the Detroit News reported.

About 700 Local 1248 workers in Warren, Michigan, turned down the proposal and said Wednesday that the contract created a third, unfair pay tier for Mopar workers that would cap their wages at a lower rate than Tier 1 and Tier 2 workers at FCA.

Under the proposed contract, veteran Tier 1 workers could receive pay raises up to $30 an hour, and newer, Tier 2 workers’ pay could go up to $25 an hour. Parts and axle operations workers pay would top out at $22 and $22.35 per hour, respectively.

Parts and service workers say the recent Fiat Chrysler Automobiles-United Auto Workers contract has created an unfair, lower paying tier and are airing their uncertainty, the Detroit News reported.

Under the proposed contract, Mopar parts distribution center workers and axle operation workers top out at $22 and $22.35 respectively — less than the Tier 1 and Tier 2 pay raises up to $30 and $25 per hour respectively.

“They created a third tier,” Lamont Carr, a Local 1248 worker, told the Detroit News.

Included in the United Auto Workers latest round of negotiations was language that protected workers at Fiat Chrysler Automobiles from discrimination based on gender identity.

“During this round of bargaining the union expressed the importance of the parties both maintaining and strengthening policies that ensure the equal treatment of all employees,” the union wrote in its white paper to members.

Michigan and Ohio do not protect workers from discrimination based on gender identity, according to the ACLU. Only Illinois, where FCA currently builds the Dodge Dart, Jeep Compass and Patriot at its Belvidere plant, has a law that protects workers from gender-identity discrimination.

The tentative pact between the United Auto Workers and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles reached Tuesday evening may eventually end the two-tiered pay system for thousands of workers at the automaker, Reuters reported.

FCA chief executive Sergio Marchionne said the agreement would do away with the separate system “over time.” Roughly 45 percent of FCA’s workforce was hired at the lower, Tier 2 pay, which is roughly $9 less per hour than older, Tier 1 workers.

According to the report, raises for both classifications of workers would be likely, although details weren’t discussed.

Representatives from the United Auto Workers and Fiat Chrysler Automobiles agreed Tuesday to extend their contract on an “hour-by-hour” basis, Reuters reported. Workers reported Tuesday for their morning shifts, but those workers could walk out at any time if talks stall.

On Monday, it became clear that the UAW would set its sights on FCA and their larger share of Tier 2 workers — workers hired after the recession at a lower hourly wage — as the union aims to “bridge the gap” between the two tiers.

According to the report, the union may opt to strike, stage a limited walkout or continue negotiations if talks reach an impasse.