Washington (AFP)
After almost a five-week strike in the United States, the UAW union announced Wednesday a preliminary agreement with the management of the car group General Motors that could put an end to this unprecedented move for more than a decade.
The text must still be approved by the National Council of the union in a vote Thursday before it is submitted to members, said a statement from the UAW. The National Council will then decide whether the strike continues until the final adoption of the text or if it stops on 17 October.
"The elected national negotiators voted to recommend to the UAW-GM National Council to accept this preliminary agreement because it brings important gains to union members," the statement said.
For the time being, the union has not given any details about the agreement itself, until the National Council approves it.
GM has remained even more discreet, merely confirming "what the UAW says in its press release on a preliminary agreement".
If the green light is given, the text of the preliminary agreement will be shared with all the members so that they can decide on it.
"This agreement will only be ratified if the UAW-GM members adopt it," the statement said.
After hiccups in recent days, things have settled between management and union.
Mary Barra, GM's CEO, joined the negotiating table on Tuesday, suggesting a close end to a strike that has crippled the automaker's production in the United States since September 16, which forced the unemployed thousands of employees including Canada and Mexico.
GM and the UAW resumed talks on Monday, after a deadlock over last week's rejection of the automaker's offer on temporary workers and job sustainability.
The negotiations were stumbling over the treatment of temporary workers who had worked for GM for at least four years.
- Hard strike -
The two parties would have found a compromise according to which these employees could be tenured after three years, according to a union source. It can not be ruled out that the duration chosen varies from the moment of finalization of an agreement.
Nearly 50,000 unionized US GM employees are on strike. They are calling for salary increases and improving the situation of employees hired after the historic 2009 bankruptcy rescue by the Obama administration.
"Everyone is affected by the five-week strike," analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch said Tuesday.
For GM, which normally produces 8,400 vehicles per day in the United States, the production shutdown causes about $ 100 million in daily loss, experts calculate.
"We estimate the operating loss at $ 2 billion for GM," says Bank of America, while the shortfall is, according to the bank, more than $ 4,000 net per employee.
On Saturday, the UAW announced a $ 25 increase in the weekly compensation paid by the union to the strikers, to $ 275, and especially the authorization to work part-time elsewhere than at GM without seeing this envelope amputated, "to condition to help hold pickets ".
The union also launched appeals for donations and solidarity and offered free meals, for example, as employees often had trouble making ends meet and were forced to tap into their savings.
A GM worker told AFP last week that she had been forced to contact United Way, a charitable organization, for financial support in paying her energy bills and loan. mortgage.
"I do not know how you can feed five kids with $ 250 a week," Betty Johnson said.
In addition to GM and North American employees, the strike also weighs on the automaker's automotive component suppliers, such as the Magna group.
© 2019 AFP