UAW Has The Advantage!

Detroit auto makers’ most critical vehicles are proving valuable bargaining chips for the United Auto Workers as the union fights to organize the largely non-union parts industry.

A strike at a small auto-parts plant in Tennessee now threatens an important vehicle for General Motors Corp. — the soon-to-launch Chevrolet Traverse crossover — at a time when the struggling auto maker can least afford a costly production delay.

Workers at the Johnson Controls Inc. factory in Columbia, Tenn., walked off the job Wednesday because the company refused to recognize the union after workers voted overwhelmingly to unionize, local UAW officials said. Johnson Controls didn’t return calls seeking comment.

Though the dispute over unionizing the factory, which employs 170 workers, has been going on for nearly two years, the union chose to send workers off the job just as production of the new Chevy is slated to begin.

It’s a strategy the UAW employed earlier this year at another small parts operation in Lansing, Mich. — a supplier for crossovers that at the time were in short supply. The strike forced GM to cut shifts at a nearby plant that builds the vehicles. The union eventually won representation.