Number on layoff will rise

As President Greg Gorecki states in his report, and as detailed above, the number of jobs we will be losing will far outpace the number of new jobs we can hope for in the next year. While retirements will offset some of the loss, it will not reduce the number of people on lay-off or keep up with the jobs we expect to lose.

We currently have about 400 members on layoff. There are 45 members scheduled to retire at the end of November. Thirteen of those members are on layoff and will be retiring from layoff.

After January 1st, only a few members are scheduled to retire in each of the following months. There is nothing planned that would bring the members remaining on layoff back to work with the exception of the few assemblers that will be brought in for the assembly of the hand-held engine in February.

When the engine lines end production sometime between April and July of 2002, there will be many more jobs gone.

Many members currently on lay-off are already in desperate situations. Even if we do get some form of extension for Unemployment Compensation, it will only be for 13 weeks.

Members are having no luck finding work because they have recall rights to Briggs & Stratton and with 24 to 29 years. Potential employers will not consider hiring them unless they quit their job at Briggs. They cannot quit without giving up the right to the “30 and out” pension. Instead, if they quit, they would only have vested rights to a pension at age 65.

People are caught between a rock and a hard place. In prior lay-offs, there had been training available, that in in some cases included extended UC benefits, to make the training feasible. For some time in the 90’s there were severance offers. The training and severance permitted members, mostly members with less than 20 years seniority, to move on with their lives. Currently there are no good options.

The Bargaining Committee is exploring ideas to deal with this problem. They will approach the Company with a proposal to permit displaced workers to get on with their lives without losing their pensions.