Woes widen for GM workers due to strike

General Motors Co. has halted car and truck production and temporarily laid off 2,000 employees at its Oshawa, Ont., plant as a massive strike at the automaker’s U.S. facilities continues to disrupt production throughout North America’s interwoven supply chains.

More than 48,000 United Auto Workers walked off the job at nearly 70 American plants on Monday after collective bargaining reached a stalemate over wages and health benefits at a time of record profits for GM, which last year announced plans to close five factories in the U.S. and Canada to save money.

Since auto manufacturing is a cross-border endeavour and most facilities only carry one or two days of parts inventory in a just-in-time system, Canadian GM plants and auto parts suppliers are bracing for fallout from the strikes south of the border.

Oshawa was the first to shutter vehicle production, on Wednesday halting its truck line that makes the GMC Sierra and Chevrolet Silverado and sending about 1,200 workers home. On Friday, it confirmed it also shut the car line that makes the Chevrolet Impala, laying off an additional 800 workers.

“We have seen disruption of our vehicle assembly work at the Oshawa Assembly Plant due to the UAW strike. We plan to resume these operations as quickly as possible upon resolution of the UAW strike,” GM Canada spokeswoman Jennifer Wright said in an emailed statement.

Oshawa, which was one of the plants slated for closure in GM’s transition strategy, is still continuing its stamping operations, Wright noted. The workers will receive their full salaries as part of a separate agreement that will see vehicle production wind down altogether at the plant in December. The facility will instead become a parts manufacturing plant, as well as home to a test track for automated vehicles. The current production stoppage does not affect the transition plans, Wright said.

GM’s plants in Ingersoll and St. Catharines continued to operate as of Friday morning. GM Canada would not speculate on whether or when Ingersoll or St. Catharines would be forced to close due to the labour action in the U.S.

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