Ingersoll Mayor Speaks About Cami Strike

Wednesday, 20 September 2017 at 05:03

Over 2,600 employees at the GM Cami Assembly plant in Ingersoll continue to walk the picket lines today.

INGERSOLL - We have now entered day 3 of of the Cami strike in Ingersoll.

Employees have been picketing outside of the plant 24/7 since the strike started on Sunday night at 11 p.m. Ingersoll Mayor Ted Comiskey worries about the potential impacts to the Town if this strike lasts for a long time.

"We have close to 2600 workers at Cami alone, but we have lot's of factory suppliers that supply Cami along with all the commercial outlets that benefit from Cami employees shopping there. All in all if the strike takes a long time it will have dramatic effects on the Town of Ingersoll. We are a town of 12,600 people and when you have a plant of that size and all of the supplying outlets not working, it is going to effect our commerical and certainly down the road our residential outlets."

Comiskey says there is no question the strike will have a dramatic impact on the town if it runs for any length of time. He says the hope right now is that the two sides will start negotating again.

"We support the fact that we need Cami within our community, we need the workers to be bringing home a pay cheque, we need that security for them and we certainly do wish them the best at the table and we hope that they do meet soon."

Wages, benefits and the addition of a new product are just some of the demands Unifor Local 88 are seeking in the recent GM Cami Assembly bargaining agreement. The two sides failed to come to agreement as of 10:59 Sunday night when union workers walked off the job from the plant in Ingersoll.

Plant chair for local 88 Mike Van Boekel told Heart FM what is on the bargaining table.

"One of the bigget issues by far is job security, as most people know now they took our Terrain away, we were the sole producer of it, and they took it to
Mexico in July. We have got the Equinox as our sole vehicle left. The only ones ever to make the Equinox, now they have made two plants, they pay $3
bucks an hour in Mexico."