Trade union takes Swedish Tesla employees on strike

Swedish trade union IF Metall has started a strike against Tesla’s Swedish service workshops. The staff are not covered by a collective agreement, which regulates employment conditions such as wages and benefits.

Tesla and Elon Musk have long been opposed to employees joining unions, and no collective agreement exists within Tesla.

The strike in Sweden means that the employees at Tesla’s workshops are asked to strike, but they cannot be forced to strike. According to several reports, Tesla has tried to break the strike, which means that employees are temporarily moved between workshops so that cars can still be repaired.

Tesla’s Swedish company has not even come to the negotiating table to discuss a collective agreement and therefore the workshop staff are now being taken out on strike. If Tesla still does not negotiate, a blockade can be initiated on November 3, which prohibits Tesla’s partners – repair shops and delivery companies – from handling Tesla cars. This may mean that the car owners do not get crash damage repaired and that new Tesla cars arriving at the port cannot be released.

Another trade union, Transport, has announced a sympathy strike, which could mean that the handling of new Tesla cars in four Swedish ports is also stopped.

”There is no other solution. We tried to arrange a negotiation in September, but received no response. This is the next step,” says Veli-Pekka Säikkälä, contract secretary at IF Metall.

The collective agreement is not a legal requirement but part of what is usually called the ”Swedish model”, and nine out of ten Swedish companies have collective agreements. This does not prevent the company from offering even better conditions, and ensures that the employees do not strike.

”It is usually only startups and small companies that do not have a collective agreement. When they have 4–5 employees, they usually contact us,” says Veli-Pekka Säikkälä.

According to previous information, Tesla has tried to find out which employees are union members and are going to strike, which is illegal.

In both Germany and the United States, voices are now being raised within Tesla to push for different forms of cooperation with unions.

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