GM to cut 375 jobs in Windsor

Mar 30, 2007 09:48 PM Canadian press
WINDSOR, Ont.–General Motors of Canada will be handing out indefinite layoff notices to 375 workers at its transmission plant in southwestern Ontario next week.
The layoffs, to affect 288 production workers and 87 skilled trades at the Windsor plant, are set to take effect on July 2.
GM Canada spokesman Stew Low said from Oshawa, Ont., that the layoffs were a result of the company's decision to end production of the Saturn Ion compact, built in Spring Hill, Tenn., which used transmissions built in Windsor.
Daily production is dropping to 3,000 transmissions per day, down from 4,000 per day, but the Windsor plant will continue to have three shifts, he said.
Bill Reeves, president of CAW Local 1973, said Friday the layoff notices are very troubling but held out the possibility they will be cancelled if sales pick up or new work is allocated to the plant, which employs about 1,300 people.
"Last year the same thing happened," Reeves told Windsor radio station CKLW. "We were supposed to have it last year but sales picked up and it was cancelled. We hope that'll happen this time."
The Windsor transmission plant also produces transmissions for models of the Chevrolet Cobalt and Malibu, Pontiac Pursuit, Saturn Vu and Aura. Other transmissions are built for export to China.
General Motors Corp., the Canadian company's U.S. parent, is undergoing a massive restructuring of its North American operations that includes more than 34,000 blue-collar workers taking buyouts or early retirement offers.
Troy Clarke, president of GM's North American operations, said last November that the company was "only beginning" a transformation that started in 2005.
Still the world's biggest automaker, General Motors has seen its share of the U.S. market eroded over the past decades from 50 per cent to about 25 per cent, with Asian-based automakers such as Japan's Toyota and Honda making major gains during the same period.
Low said that the North American-built Saturn Ion is being replaced by the Saturn Astra, built in Germany by GM's Opel division. The car is based in the Opel Astra, which has been successful in Europe, he said.
Apart from the Windsor transmission plants, GM doesn't plan any layoffs at its Canadian operations, Low said.
"Actually, we've been fortunate in Canada. The vehicles we build here and the components that we build here have had strong demand," Low said.
In Oshawa, where GM has its biggest Canadian manufacturing operation, the company assembles several models of cars and two full-size pickup trucks.
"Oshawa has two car plants. The one plant has had a little bit of what we call down time, where you send people home for a week. But the other plant has been running three shifts plus a bit of overtime. So it's been pretty good here as strength of our manufacturing business," Low said.
In the Oshawa truck plant, the company makes Chevrolet Silverado and GMC Sierra. One of the car plants makes the Chevrolet Impala and Buick Monte Carlo. The other builds the Buick LaCrosse and Allure and the Pontiac Grand Prix.