Mitsubishi workers in Illinois ratify contract
NORMAL -- United Auto Workers members at a central Illinois plant ratified a four-year contract with Mitsubishi Motors North America on Saturday that calls for them to take pay cuts in exchange for job security.
Mitsubishi agreed to no involuntary layoffs for the more than 1,200 workers at the Normal plant and guaranteed the facility will stay open through Aug. 30, 2012, when the new contract expires.
Voting concluded Saturday. A UAW Local 2488 spokesman said 54 percent of voting members approved the contract and 46 percent voted against it.
"The bargaining team delivered an agreement that will protect jobs and provide four years of stability for our members and their communities," UAW President Ron Gettelfinger said in a Saturday statement.
The agreement, effective Monday, also includes a two-tiered wage system, retirement offers and medical benefit changes.
UAW members had been working without a contract since a labor agreement expired Sept. 5, after the union unanimously rejected the automaker's latest offer.
"We are extremely pleased with this agreement," Shiro Futaki, Mitsubishi's manufacturing president and CEO, said in a statement Saturday.
Futaki said the contract illustrates how both sides have recognized "the tough issues facing the U.S. automotive industry and we have worked together toward solving them."
The plant, which produces the Eclipse, Eclipse Spyder, Galant and Endeavor, has been the focus of company cutbacks for several years.
Mitsubishi reduced the plant's work force by about 100 buyouts over the summer.
In 2006, workers agreed to pay and benefit cuts in exchange for the promise that their jobs would be safe for two years. The union narrowly voted to accept that pact, which expired Aug. 28. Both sides agreed to extend the agreement until Sept. 5.
The plant laid off 1,200 workers in 2004 as part of a worldwide plan that the Tokyo-based parent company Mitsubishi Motors Corp. called its final chance to survive. Union members also went on a one-day strike in Normal in 2001.
The plant opened in 1988. It now employs fewer than half the workers it did at its peak about 10 years ago.