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Filed under: Etc., Government/Legal, UAW/Unions

United Auto Workers president Bob King

It sounds ominous. The United Auto Workers union has imported interns from other automaking countries like China, Germany, South Korea and India to teach them the organizing techniques the union uses in the United States. The UAW’s Global Organizing Institute will give interns from other car building countries an indoctrination into the practices the union uses for collective bargaining, which they will then take back to their home countries and act as homegrown advocates for the UAW’s organizing efforts at non-unionized transplant facilities in the United States.

Bob King, UAW president, has a goal of bringing his union to one of the currently non-unionized transplant auto factories in the American south. With agents arguing for the UAW on the homefront and the union doing its best to get a transplant automaker on board, the union hopes it can not only help workers organize in other countries, but also help its own causes.

The UAW has asked for no interference from the leaders of those car companies and has threatened to use protests and other attention-grabbing practices should any automaker try to strongarm its workers into staying non-union. The interns will be given six weeks of training and field experience before they’re sent back to their home countries packing a new arsenal of skills.

[Source: Automotive News – sub. req.]

UAW creates Global Organizing Institute to organize transplants originally appeared on Autoblog on Thu, 24 Mar 2011 17:28:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Filed under: UAW/Unions

Bob King

According to Automotive News, UAW President Bob King has his eye on organizing labor forces at the manufacturing facilities of German and Asian automakers here in the States. At this point, it’s unclear which automaker or which plant the UAW will attempt to organize first, though King has said that he has sent letters to the CEOs of the transplant automakers informing them of the union’s intentions. King says that the UAW is only interested in cooperating to improve operations, and that it will kick off the campaign towards organization in January.

In the meantime, the UAW has called off protests at Toyota dealerships around the country as a gesture of goodwill. The union began picketing the dealerships when the Japanese automaker decided to close its NUMMI assembly plant in Freemont, California after its partner, General Motors, pulled out of the endeavor. (the facility is now in use by Toyota partner Tesla Motors).

Automotive News reports that Toyota says that it will leave it up its workers to decide whether or not organization under the UAW is in their best interest. The company has been building vehicles in the U.S. for about 25 years, and in that time, workers have never sought organization – despite repeated drives by the UAW.

[Source: Automotive News – sub. req. | Image: Bill Pugliano / Getty Images]

Report: King pledges UAW to begin organizing transplants in January originally appeared on Autoblog on Fri, 24 Dec 2010 16:25:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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