Last minute talks between General Motors and the auto workers union in Canada hit a snag on Sunday, labour officials said.
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“We don’t have an agreement right now. But there is a disagreement between GM Canada and the CAW, and the federal government,” Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) spokeswoman Shannon Devine told Reuters.
No agreement was expected imminently, Devine added.
The Canadian federal government in Ottawa had given GM and the CAW until last Friday (15 May) to renegotiate a labour contract deemed critical to GM’s survival, or risk losing a bailout of up to C$3bn (US$2.5bn), the news agency noted.
“We’re still working on it, but it could take a couple more days because of these latest complications,” Devine said.
CAW president Ken Lewenza has said in an earlier statement that talks would proceed on Sunday after “progress” was made on important points, although many issues remained “unresolved”.
“Our CAW negotiating team continues to work hard to reach an agreement with General Motors,” Lewenza said in the statement late on Saturday, a day after Canadian government deadline.
“We will continue our talks as we work towards reaching a tentative agreement that we can bring back to our membership for ratification,” he added.
“We have made some progress, however, there are a number of key issues that remain unresolved at this point.”
According to Reuters, Canadian prime minister Stephen Harper had said earlier a taxpayer-funded bailout was “dependent upon all of the stakeholders making the difficult decisions necessary to ensure the viability of the company”.
But Lewenza on Friday called GM’s demands for deep labour cost cuts “overzealous” and insisted there was “no way” the union would make the wide-ranging concessions proposed by the company, the report added.
Last week, a Toronto paper said a pension shortfall of more than C$7bn was a major barrier to any cost-cutting deal between the CAW union and General Motors Canada.
The Globe and Mail said Ottawa thought the province of Ontario – home to the country’s auto industry – had jurisdiction for settling the pension issue, and must also contribute one-third of the overall loan package that Canada could provide in collaboration with the US government.
But Ontario officials maintained that the pension deficit was part of GM Canada’s overall financial problems and needed to be solved as part of the overall restructuring package.
