Decision might help to retain 750 jobs

GM has announced that it will add a third shift to its Oshawa (Ontario) assembly and nearby St. Catharines powertrain plant in the next few months to accommodate anticipated demand for the all new 2013 Chevrolet Impala, built at Oshawa. St. Catharines will provide the six-speed front-wheel-drive automatic transmission for the car. According to the Canadian Auto Workers (CAW) union, a new contract ratified last month will see GM add a shift to Oshawa's "flex line" early next year, creating or maintaining 900 jobs, as well as keeping open the Oshawa "consolidated line" through June 2014 at least (it had been scheduled to close in June 2013). That move will reportedly retain 750 jobs; the possibility of adding a second shift to the consolidated line could add another 750.

Significance:  GM's contract with the CAW does not seem to create many jobs, but at least maintains what it has and brings laid off GM CAW workers back to work. GM has been moving to duplicate production on many Canadian-built products in US plants, such as the reopening of the Spring Hill (Tennessee) plant that now builds CAMI-built Chevrolet Equinoxes, and the Detroit-Hamtramck plant which is also adding production of the new Impala. The strategy has worried the CAW, and rightfully so—should GM not get a favorable contract when it next comes up in 2016 or if exchange rates have continued to deteriorate, shifting production out of Canada to the US could be significantly less difficult four years from now than it is today.

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