#caw

The Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) union has agreed with Ford Motor Co. on a four-year deal that will create about 600 jobs at the American automaker’s Oakville, Ontario plant.

Mixing business and emotion is dangerous, as some 2,000 workers in Oshawa, Canada are learning today. The GM plant they work at, which manufactures the Chevrolet Impala and runs a flex line for the Equinox, will axe 2,000 jobs.

As a government imposed June 1st bankruptcy deadline looms on the horizon, the UAW is reporting that it has reached a tentative agreement with General Motors and the U.S. Treasury.

Starting Monday, Chrysler will idle most of its plants as the company restructures under a Chapter 11 bankruptcy filing. This will include 8 U.S. assembly plants, as well as facilities in Canada and Mexico. Other pre-assembly facilities will also face temporary closure including five North American engine plants, six stamping plants and seven transmission plants.

Less than a day after the UAW, Chrysler and Fiat agreed upon the terms of a contract that would keep the struggling U.S. automaker afloat, details of the agreement have surfaced in which the union will take a controlling share in Chrysler.

The Canadian Auto Workers union, after burning the letter written by Chrysler CEO Bob Nardelli and joint-president Tom Lasorda, has now responded with its own statement.

CAW president Ken Lewenza denies that a $19 labor gap exists between Canadian and U.S. workers and refuses to re-negotiate a contract that has already been re-neogotiated. 

Lewenza calls the $76 per hour wage “inflated and artificial” and says that it, “includes many non-relevant factors, such as expenses associated with retirees who have not worked at Chrysler for years, and payroll taxes which are paid to government not to workers.” He continues: “Perhaps most galling of all, Chrysler’s number even includes the proportional cost of downtime and lay-offs. In essence, we are being ‘charged’ for our own unemployment. The best way to reduce that artificial $76 number is to put Chrysler workers back to work: that alone would reduce hourly costs by several dollars per hour.”

Regardless of how you view the statistics, Lewenza makes two other strong points. First, he says that Toyota and Honda (both of which are non-unionized) have made it well-known that they match wages and other benefits with unionized automakers. In other words, the wage that Chrysler employees are making is fair because it’s what the other companies are paying their staff. Second, Lewenza says that the bond holders haven’t had to make any concessions at all.

Unfortunately for Lewenza and the CAW, it doesn’t matter what they say and it seems that if the $19 gap isn’t closed then Fiat won’t partner with Chrysler, the federal governments in both Canada and the United States won’t keep the cash flowing. As a result Chrysler will be forced into bankruptcy, something Lewenza calls, “an increasingly likely prospect.”

Read the full letter after the jump:

Fiat is about ready to walk away from a potential partnership with Chrysler says CEO Sergio Marchionne unless the U.S. automaker can significantly cut labor costs. While the United Auto Workers union has made it known that it is willing to work with Fiat and Chrysler management, the Canadian Auto Workers union isn’t.