Start United States USA — Political G. M. and Union in Canada Reach Tentative Agreement to End Strike

G. M. and Union in Canada Reach Tentative Agreement to End Strike

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Workers at the plant in Ontario that makes the Chevrolet Equinox S. U. V. are to vote on Monday. They protested the shift of some production to Mexico.
General Motors and Canada’s largest trade union have reached a tentative agreement in a labor dispute that has idled an Ontario plant that makes a popular sport utility vehicle, the Chevrolet Equinox.
Some 2,800 members of the Unifor trade union will vote Monday on whether to ratify the pact. If it is approved, production of the Equinox could resume as early as Monday night.
Both Unifor and G. M. declined to release the terms of the settlement before the vote.
Workers at G. M.’s plant in Ingersoll went on strike last month to protest the shift of some production to Mexico that led to the loss of about 600 Canadian production jobs. It was the first strike at a Canadian auto assembly plant in 21 years.
The dispute flared up amid rising tensions between Canada and the Trump administration over the future of the North American Trade Agreement and increasing Canadian worries about losing factory jobs to lower-wage plants in Mexico. Canada has lost thousands of auto industry jobs over the last decade as automakers have rushed to build a string of new plants in Mexico and in the southern United States.
Representatives of Canada, Mexico and the Trump administration are currently in talks about restructuring Nafta. President Trump has criticized the trade agreement and investments by American automakers in Mexican plants.
Unifor raised concerns with G. M. after the company in July shifted assembly of the GMC Terrain, an S. U. V. that shares many parts with the Equinox, to a Mexican factory that also makes the Equinox.
G. M. has said that it has no plans to move Equinox production out of Ingersoll. It recently spent 800 million Canadian dollars (about $650 million) to upgrade the plant to make a redesigned version of the S. U. V., and intends to run the plant around the clock once production resumes.
The Equinox competes in one of the fastest-growing segments in the North American auto industry. In the first nine months of the year, sales in the United States of the midsize S. U. V. have risen 22 percent to more than 212,000 vehicles, according to Autodata Corporation.
It is the second-highest selling Chevrolet model, after the Silverado pickup truck. It competes with the Honda CR-V and Toyota RAV4.
The Ingersoll factory is owned by G. M., but it was originally used in a joint venture with Suzuki. That means its workers are not covered by the union agreement that Unifor reached with G. M. last year for its other Canadian plants.
Tensions over different work rules in Ingersoll gave the factory a reputation for labor militancy during the joint-venture years. Unifor has sought a commitment to continue and expand production in Canada.

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