AFSCME 3357-HOF'S BLOG

Visteon & Ford renegotiate deal

Several years ago, Ford split of most of its component operations into a new company called Visteon. To make the deal work, Ford cut a deal with the UAW that UAW workers in the Visteon plants would continue to be Ford employees covered by the Ford collective bargaining agreement. New hires at Visteon, would have a lower wage rate more in line with independent component manufactures.

How did it work? Not that well. At least, not well enough. (Yes, those are sentence fragments, deal with it.) Visteon lost $1.2 Billion in 2003, $1.5 Billion in 2004, and is on track for another whopper loss this year. With the threat of insolvency of a major component maker, Ford has to cut a deal. The deal in process is for Ford to take back a dozen or so plants that it rolled into Visteon. Ford plans to roll the plants into a separate operation and sell them to other companies. To get UAW approval, Ford will offer buyouts and early retirement to a good portion of the UAW workers.

What does that mean for our AFSCME 3357 members? It means that the membership base supporting many of our offices will have a much lower UAW membership base to support. In other words, it is likely that we will lose attorneys either through attrition, layoffs or both. Up to 17,000 UAW members are affected.

The Car Connection - UAW Eyes Visteon Deal - Ford hopes to sell off some plants, radically downsizing its former supplier.