By Bernie Woodall
DETROIT (Reuters) - United Auto Workers members at a Detroit-area Ford Motor Co (N:F) plant to be kept open thanks to a new product promised in a proposed labor contract overwhelmingly approved the pact, a UAW official said on Friday.
UAW Local 900 President Bill Johnson said 81 percent of those who voted at the Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne supported the new four-year contract. He said 2,548 voted.
Production workers voted 81 percent in favor and a smaller number of skilled trades workers voted 83 percent in favor, he said.
The facility is the first large Ford assembly plant to tally voting for the contract that was agreed on by Ford and UAW negotiators. Voting at Ford plants, which have about 53,000 UAW workers, continues through next Wednesday.
Union officials and labor analysts had expected broad support for the new contract at the plant because its future was uncertain before the recent labor talks, after Ford announced earlier this year that production of the two small cars made there would shift elsewhere.
Harley Shaiken, labor professor at the University of California-Berkley, said the wide margin at the Wayne plant bodes well for ratification of the Ford contract. The UAW-Ford proposed contract calls for new products to be placed in the plant in 2018 and by 2020. Sources have said they will be a midsize pickup truck and an SUV that would revive the nameplate of the Ford Bronco, a popular 80s-era model. Ford pledged to spend $9 billion at its U.S. operations during the four years covered in the contract, which also eliminated a two-tier pay system for assembly plant workers. The union and each of the Detroit Three automakers agreed in separate labor contracts to an eight-year process from hiring to top pay, which will be about $30 per hour by 2019.
Since 2007, newer UAW members hired at the Detroit Three have made considerably less than veteran workers, with no path to top pay.
Fiat Chrysler (N:FCAU) Automobiles (N:FCAU) (MI:FCHA) workers who rejected an initial proposed contract that did not fully bridge the pay gap overwhelmingly supported a second version that closed it.
General Motors Co (N:GM) UAW members voted to ratify their contract, but formal ratification is being delayed because skilled trades workers voted against the deal, and the union said it is working to address that issue.