As Volkswagen employees cast ballots on whether to unionize the automaker's Chattanooga, Tennessee, assembly plant, both Volkswagen and the United Auto Workers have given Senator Bob Corker flak for pushing a non-union vote. During the first of a three-day vote on Wednesday, Republican Corker, said that "should the workers vote against the UAW, Volkswagen will announce in the coming weeks that it will manufacture its new mid-size SUV here in Chattanooga." Volkswagen, which agreed to a union vote last week after years of lobbying by the UAW, had previously stated it was "committed to neutrality." In response to Corker, VW Chattanooga CEO Frank Fischer said there was "no connection" between tooling a new assembly line and the potential presence of a union.
Corker was referring to VW's upcoming three-row SUV—shown last year in Detroit as the CrossBlue concept, which we drove in the fall—that would be built alongside the Passat, the only model that has been assembled at VW's plant since it opened in 2011. While Volkswagen has been tight-lipped about the production site of the CrossBlue, and speculation has suggested it could easily be moved to the brand's new Mexican facility in Puebla, it's hard to imagine the SUV built anywhere outside of Chattanooga. VW's Mexican facilities assemble smaller MQB-underpinned models—Beetle, Golf, Jetta, and Jetta SportWagen—while Chattanooga's Passat rides on a larger version of that platform, which would be similar to the architecture beneath the CrossBlue.
Corker didn't say who he spoke with, but made a second statement yesterday inferring that Volkswagen executives either in the U.S. or Germany had told him the alleged news. VW employs about 1500 full-time hourly workers in Chattanooga, and only those workers, not the several hundred additional salaried employees or hourly contract workers, are eligible to vote for UAW representation.
VW of America remains under intense pressure from Wolfsburg to double its annual sales from the 400,000-plus it achieved in 2012 and 2013 to 800,000 by 2018. Further emphasis has been placed on U.S. sales after Volkswagen deliveries were down 7 percent last year versus the year before, while the automotive market as a whole grew by nearly 8 percent. In an effort to help achieve the brand's 2018 goal, management wants the Chattanooga plant to increase annual output by 100,000. The addition of CrossBlue production would go some way to achieving that goal, as would a broader acceptance of the Passat among U.S. shoppers.
- Long-Term Road Test: 2013 Volkswagen Passat TDI
- Instrumented Test: 2014 Volkswagen Jetta
- First Drive: 2015 Volkswagen Golf
Should VW workers decide to unionize, not all of them will have to join. Tennessee is one of 24 "Right to Work" states in which companies cannot force union membership as a condition of employment. And while Michigan passed a "Right to Work" law in April 2013, the UAW can continue to require union dues and fees until its contract expires in 2015. Even then, no one knows how that could affect workers or the union's hold on the Big Three.
Voting ends tonight at 8:30, and Volkswagen is expected to announce the results sometime after 10:00.
from Car and Driver Blog http://ift.tt/nSHy27
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