GM, Chrysler reach tentative agreement with UAW

GM and Chrysler have reached a tentative agreement with the UAW on some key modifications to the 2007 contract, but talks continue over the issue of allowing the automakers to use stock rather than cash to pay half their obligations to the Voluntary Employees’ Beneficiary Associations set up in the contract to oversee autoworker health care. Automotive News reports on some of the key concessions agreed upon:

On the eve of filing its viability plan to the federal government, Chrysler got the UAW to move on several fronts, the source said. Instead of paying overtime for work beyond eight hours, Chrysler will pay overtime only for work beyond 40 hours during a week, the source said.

The union gave up two of the four lump-sum bonuses due workers during the four-year contract, the source said.

Supplemental unemployment benefits also have been limited. Idled workers with more than 20 years of service can collect SUB pay for 52 weeks at the traditional 72 percent of take-home pay and another 52 weeks at half pay, the source said. Workers with less than 20 years get 72 percent SUB pay for 39 weeks and half pay for an additional 39 weeks, the source said.

Those SUB provisions are all that UAW members can get now that the Jobs Bank has been eliminated. The Jobs Bank was a program that guaranteed idled workers 95 percent of pay and full benefits indefinitely if no other job could be found for them.

But there are still ongoing disputes over the healthcare fund. Under the current contract, GM is due to pay $20 billion to the union-run fund that will administer the healthcare for all retired autoworkers starting in 2010, but the company wants the union to accept half of that payment in stock rather than cash. The UAW walked away from the bargaining table over that issue last weekend, then returned to the negotiations a day later. But it’s clear that the two sides remain far apart on this particular concession.