Negotiations between Chrysler Canada and the Canadian Auto Workers include reducing an $80m healthcare bill for ‘snowbird’ retirees.
Go deeper with GlobalData
Discover B2B Marketing That Performs
Combine business intelligence and editorial excellence to reach engaged professionals across 36 leading media platforms.
These are people who escape the country’s Arctic winters and spend those months in Florida and other warmer locations, the Globe and Mail said.
The bill, part of a $1.6bn healthcare obligation for Chrysler Canada’s employees, represents the difference between provincial health care rates and those that retirees incur outside Ontario, the Toronto paper said, citing a memo from Chrysler president Tom LaSorda.
The memo sent to managers at Chrysler’s three Canadian plants said the $80m was one of several elements that mades the automaker’s local union contract more expensive than Chrysler’s with the United Auto Workers in the US and General Motors of Canada’s with the CAW.
The paper said Chrysler was sticking to its position that it needed a contract with the CAW that went beyond the concessions the union gave to GM Canada, if it was to keep its plants in Brampton and Windsor, Ontario, operating.
