Members Spirits up at Laborfest, Insurance Increases coming at Briggs & Layoffs create Conflict at Strattec

Labor Day

The rain might have held the attendance down on Labor Day, but it sure didn't dampen the spirit of the marchers and Laborfest participants. It was especially exciting for Jodi Saggio, a sister from PACE 7-209 who won the drawing for a brand new Harley Sportster.

Judging by the number of politicians that frequented this year's festival, it was clear to see they obviously felt Labor will play a big part in the primary election in September and the November 5th general election. Even politicians who notoriously have turned their nose up and snubbed working people were there trying to court some votes from the very same people they've ignored all of these years. One thing has become very clear over the years, that unless you get people in political office that support working people we'll never have things addressed that are important to us. (For example: health care cost, prescription cost, family medical leave, ergonomic issues and the right to organize)

This year, as in every year, check the voting records on issues that are important to you and other working families. Get out to support those candidates, and encourage your friends and neighbors to do the same. If we want things to change for the better WE have to force that change.

Flight Attendants

For those of you who were not able to attend Laborfest or see the parade and interviews on TV the parade was led by the Flight Attendant from Midwest Express Airlines. If you get the chance to support those attendants, please do so. From all the unbiased reports that we are able to hear, Midwest Express has not been fair to those employees at all. Their salaries range from a beginning of $ 18,000 per year to somewhere around $ 36,000 per year for the most senior.

The company has been dragging out the contract talks for 3 years. During that time, the attendants have not received a raise, while the rest of the company does. Now the management tries to hide behind the 9-11-01 terrorist attack, trying to say that they are going through tough times. While it is obvious that airlines as a whole have suffered, they had 2 years before that to agree to a contract. It appears that they are trying to break the Union rather than negotiate with it.

Briggs

We are being told by the insurance department that in certain E.P.O. plans we could see some increases. The cost increases at the Aurora clinics were held to only the additional contribution that the Company makes, However utilization has increased which will result in increased premium costs for members. We are waiting to review the data from the Company. This is one area the Company hopes to reduce costs by opening the clinic at the Burleigh plant.

Rumor Mill

The Vice-President of Milwaukee operations held informational meetings to try and squelch some of the rumors that have circulated through the plant. He addressed the issue about Briggs entering into a partnership with another company to run the Die Cast division. He also stated that if this plan came to fruition, it would be moved some where in the Milwaukee area, and would be using our people to run the operation. He stated it would take about one year to transition the division to a new location. If this would happen, the Company then has a tentative plan, to move the operations in the south building of the Burleigh plant to the area that Die Cast would vacate. The plan then calls for them to tear down the two-story building on the south end of the plant.

Right now this is a plan, but has not yet been finalized. The Company has said that they will notify the Union if this happens, and before it goes to the press. Our course of action will be to have the Joint Board notify all the stewards and the stewards will then relay the message to our members in their area.

At Menomonee Falls, the Company continues to move forward in the area of a measured daywork system. The Union was initially introduced to this earlier this year. As of the time of this writing, nothing further has been discussed. There are several things that will have to be agreed to before the Union accepts this change in our system. Things liketimed movements, accepted values, allowances and rate of pay. Another thing that Menomonee Falls management has yet to address is, their future plans for doing business after the lease runs out with Harley. For a while, the Falls plant was rumored to be moving to the Burleigh plant. With all the other changes planned for the Burleigh plant one can only wonder where the Service Division could fit out there, now that the north end of the plant is being leased to Generac for storage and the future of the south end being up in the air, pending the Die Cast partnership.

The Union received three WARN notices from Briggs in the last three months. All the reduction from those notices will take place in October. M-8 will reduce 13 jobs around October 1st. M7P will reduce nine jobs about Oct. 18th and the last one will reduce ten jobs in F7X and one in M7X. I know this is disturbing to hear but it will get worse before it gets better. We still have a few more machining jobs from the north end of the Burleigh plant that will be moved along with the green line, which will go down at the end of the year. The EX engine that the Company touted for coming to the north end of the Burleigh plant has been pushed back another 9 months. Originally scheduled for July 2004, the new date is now April of 2005.

Briggs employees have called asking about an E.V.A. check because Briggs reported a good 4th quarter. Unfortunately the E.V.A. fell short: The best figures we could come up with, the Company’s NOPAT – (Net Operating Profit After Taxes) was about $ 75 million, it would have to be somewhere in the $ 99 million range for our E.V.A. to kick in. These are the figures our financial secretary came up with, and he watches the earnings very closely. No E.V.A. bonus for our members at Briggs.

Strattec

Layoffs have created problems with some members not being allowed to bump lateral or down in their own department. Job consolidation has only been completed in 2 areas, and even in those areas the Company is not being consistent when applying the contract. The Union had filed some policy grievances pertaining to these issues. One grievance was settled prior to the September 4th third stage meeting. At the time this article was written, we had not received an answer on the other policy grievances that were heard. One issue that has become very volatile is the discussions we’ve had on training. The Company has trained some lower senior people while ignoring requests from more senior members, to be trained. This has caused problems at the time of layoffs because the Company wants to bypass seniority and base it’s layoffs on qualifications. The Union argued this was not acceptable because, in the skilled trade area, there is no job preference. Managers assign jobs to our members, and if they are not given the opportunity to learn different jobs, they should not be punished for that reason. The Company did say that they would review their training policy.

Arbitration Update

The Union and the Company have met three times in attempting to resolve the outsourcing grievance before it goes to arbitration, which is scheduled for two days in mid-October. Also October 14th is the arbitration date set for an employee who was discharged because of their erratic and threatening behavior. This case was scheduled for July 31st but was postponed due to an emergency in the arbitrator’s family.

The Union and Company are at odds over the interpretation of jobs that are eliminated. We feel the elimination language is clear on page 33 of the contract where it states "employees affected, by a job or jobs sent out of the plant". The Company has contested that the indirect jobs are not to be considered job elimination.

Their own inconsistent application of this has caused confusion. The Company claims some jobs are being cut back due to a reduction in orders. That being the case, the Company should be posting a voluntary layoff for those particular jobs.

In my opinion, the Company recently has been consulting with their attorney on so many things, leading to more conflict. Because of this, it seems that Karl is able to get fewer things settled causing the grievance process to get pushed through many more stages.