‘We are moving nearer to Delphi motioning the bankruptcy court to pitch out our labor agreement,’ said ‘The Future of the Union’ rank and file movement in the UAW last Saturday.
This will mean huge cuts in wages, healthcare and pensions for Delphi workers.
In a call to arms, the movement continued:–
‘The mood inside the Delphi E&S World Headquarters in Kokomo gets darker with every passing day. The fighting spirit is growing underneath, but often stopped in its tracks when demonstrated by the very people who should be coordinating, organising and cultivating it.
‘They can do that, all we can do is grieve it,’ says one union official.
‘No mobilization or concerted resistance is being organised by local union officials in Kokomo, just the basic protocol and business-as-usual scenario.
‘Meanwhile, management uses this time to lay out their assault on the workers in Kokomo unlike we have ever seen.
‘The workers apparently don’t have enough stress already that members of management must insist on draconian disciplines and chronic contract violations. Trivial and petty as the following things are to some people, they are serious issues of harassment to many workers and an example of mismanagement priorities at Delphi Kokomo.
‘A worker was recently sent home for a balance of shift when simply using a door in the plant that management claims should not be used anymore. Other workers are given written or verbal warnings; meanwhile management themselves use the door on daily basis. An older hourly worker whose feet are literally bleeding from standing up on her job all day is threatened with discipline for going out the same door and forced to walk hundreds of feet around an entire department instead.
‘Some workers are reporting that they are getting physically searched going in and out of the factory every day. Workers are reporting that they are being watched by management while eating lunch in their vehicles. Nearly every break room at every break has at least one supervisor sitting inside listening to everything the workers talk about trying to look inconspicuous.
‘High level supervisors patrol the parking lots at break and lunch times looking for workers instead of doing their jobs in the plant. Shift times are getting changed around causing serious outgoing and incoming traffic problems resulting in the misuse of handicap parking and older workers having to walk nearly around the plant just to get to their departments.
‘Some second shift workers have reported that they now have to come in 20 minutes early off the clock just to make it on time or to even find a closer parking spot. Other workers at the same time are reporting being escorted out by security for being inside the plant a mere 20 minutes before their shift starts or 20 minutes after their shift ends.
‘A pregnant worker standing on her feet all day on the line is disciplined for going to the bathroom.
Another worker threatened for simply getting a drink of water with sweat dripping from his forehead.
‘A worker is suddenly accused of causing scrap and threatened with “possible discharge” even as his machine has been on record for causing scrap due to a process failure for months. Large amounts of product quality spills occur on nearly a weekly basis in various areas of Delphi Kokomo.
‘High level “General Supervisors” and “Plant Managers” – instead of worrying about product quality, frequent quality spills from suppliers, product improvement, talking to customers or even meeting our deadlines – spend a large amount of their days walking the departments looking for someone who may be coming back from lunch a few minutes late, checking time clock sheets for anyone calling in sick so they can harass them, discipline them and even harass their doctors to verify their sickness.
‘Workers are told they must have a doctor’s note for any unscheduled day off regardless of the emergency or situation. If a pipe bursts in a worker’s house and their living room filled with water, a supervisor says a worker must have a doctor’s note to be “excused”. Without it, the hourly workers in Kokomo are disciplined with suspension and even discharge.
‘High-level supervisors, instead of wondering why an entire product line is down because of quality issues, are walking around the factory looking for workers chewing gum, eating a candy bar or a worker who has a water bottle in their purse. Meanwhile, they discipline anyone who refuses to wear their hot and heavy “shop coats” that proudly display their “team concept” on the front of them.
‘Instead of dealing with suppliers who are not sending this “bankrupt” auto supplier their shipments due to failure to pay the bills, these high level members of management march through departments like slave drivers. Perhaps they will get lucky and catch people with a newspaper on a down line, maybe someone talking on a cell phone or anything else they can do to make the lives of the workers more stressful.
‘A worker with no attendance problem whose spouse is expected to go give birth any day is disciplined by a supervisor under higher up management orders for using his legal contractual “call-in pay” with a “reasonable” excuse of his spouse having a hard and complication pregnancy often prone to chronic sickness. The contract violation is pointed out and only mocked by management. The contract violation and the entire grievance procedure is laughed at by management during the unjust “discipline” interview.
‘The union officials are treated like little kids and talked to like dogs. Union officials as a result merely stack up countless grievances while the workers suffer great oppression. They call this process in Kokomo “cooperation” and “team work”.
‘Contractual obligations and business ethics do not exist to Delphi management in Kokomo. After all, they are tossing it out like a piece of garbage up at the top of the corporate ladder. Why should they care here in the factories if their own CEO doesn’t?
‘Forget product quality, the products we make or even the future of Delphi; management is focusing on the workers themselves. That is what this whole bankruptcy is about, the workers and how to bust their union.
‘Solidarity is not mere rhetoric used by union officials and this everyone for themselves mentality on the shop floor is failure of our leadership not the rank-n-file.
‘They want us to “wait and see” how many more workers will be abused, harassed, oppressed, threatened, disciplined, humiliated and then ultimately their entire livelihoods destroyed by the bankruptcy court.
‘Delphi Kokomo is a profitable facility and a key battleground for the future of this union.
‘We are protected in concerted activity under federal law. United we can fight back here and now on the shop floor. We need to fight back, work to rule, unite with our co-workers, and organise our departments to resist these attacks.’
