On the Picket Line

UAW members win raises, COLA, end tiers at Daimler

May 13, 2024
BY DIANE SHUR, JANE ROLAND AND SUE SKINNER

STATESVILLE, N.C. — A tentative contract agreement was announced between Daimler Truck and the United Auto Workers April 26, an hour before the strike deadline. According to UAW officials the four-year agreement will include raises of at least 25%, the end of wage tiers, and a first-time cost-of-living adjustment clause to raise wages as prices rise.

Gains made by UAW strikes last fall against Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis, including workers at the GM Services Parts Operations in Charlotte, brought wide attention in the labor movement and inspired Daimler workers.

On March 8 union members voted by 96% to authorize a strike if needed. In recent weeks hundreds of workers have turned out at union rallies and “practice pickets,” many of them wearing shirts with the slogan “Tick tock” — noting the clock was running down on the contract’s expiration and their willingness to strike.

Some 7,000 workers covered by the agreement work at four plants in North Carolina, where Freightliner and Western Star trucks, and Thomas Built buses are built. The new agreement would raise workers’ pay in the bus plant to match wages paid to truck plant workers. Another 300 union members covered by the contract work at parts distribution centers in Georgia and Tennessee.

Tanya Hendrix, who has worked for Daimler’s plant in Cleveland, North Carolina, for 27 years, told the media that bargaining was different this time, with workers unwilling to accept concessions. “We wanted big raises and we won. We wanted a cost-of-living increase and we won.”

Workers at Daimler have been in the UAW for decades, with workers in the Mount Holly plant winning union representation in 1990. It took a 17-day strike for them to win the first contract in December 1991.

Hundreds of Daimler workers who rallied at the Local 3520 union hall here April 27 to hear about the tentative agreement erupted with an extended ovation when veteran strikers from Local 5285 at the Mount Holly plant were invited up on the stage.

UAW members at the rally told the Militant that Nissan, Hyundai and BMW plants were also in their sights. Margarita Sanders, a UAW Local 5287 member, said she was excited about helping other organizing efforts. “If they need us, we’ll be there!”

The agreement comes one week after workers at the Volkswagen assembly plant in Chattanooga, Tennessee, voted overwhelmingly to bring the UAW into the plant, the first foreign-owned auto plant in the South to be organized. Workers at the Mercedes-Benz plant in Vance, Alabama, will vote on union representation May 13-17.

UAW members will meet in upcoming weeks to discuss the tentative Daimler agreement and then vote on it.