CANADA

Union reaches tentative agreement with Integram Magna, ending strike

CBC
Mon, November 13, 2023 

Unifor members of Integram Seating in Lakeshore are on the picket line when the strike first began on Nov. 8. (Unifor Local 444/Facebook - image credit)

Workers at Integram Magna in Lakeshore reached a tentative agreement on Sunday night, the union representing workers said.

Unifor Local 444, representing about 900 workers at the seating manufacturer, had been on strike since Nov. 8.

On Sunday night, the union said members were to return to work Monday morning.

"I feel good. I mean, we had some tough bargaining going on there. We knew we had to secure not only wages and bring wages up for people, but we had to secure longevity of the facility as well with future work," said Dave Cassidy, Unifor Local 444 president.

The Patillo Road factory produces seating used in vehicles assembled at the Stellantis plant in Windsor.

The facility is part of the Magna International manufacturing group.

Reached Monday morning, Dave Niemiec, the director of corporate communications for Magna, said the company could confirm it reached a tentative agreement and that workers were back on the job.

Niemiec said ratification votes are expected later this week, but could not provide any details of the tentative agreement pending ratification.

Cassidy said that while the union didn't get everything, the deal will make Integram workers the "highest paid tier one supplier in all of Canada."

"They're going to be compensated very well, but they're worth it. They worked very hard," he said.

"We were able to achieve some very good gains for our membership which is exciting to be able to bring back to them especially under the you know the job security as well."

A tier one supplier is a plant that provides parts directly to the vehicle manufacturers.

The deal comes just two weeks after Unifor members at Stellantis voted to ratify their new collective agreement, after a brief seven-hour strike.

Stellantis was the last of the Detroit Three automakers to negotiate with Unifor in this year's auto talks.

Setting the bar

Cassidy said the deal reached with the other automakers and Stellantis sets the bar for this deal and others to come.

"The deal that we reached at Stellantis is going to be a bar setting for all of bargaining moving forward," he said.

"You know we are going to have some struggles with some of our parts suppliers as we go into the new year … and they watch what the OEM's got."

Unifor Local 444 will negotiate new collective agreements for four more tier one parts suppliers in early 2024.

Ratification votes on the deal are expected this weekend.