The current strike in Sweden at American auto giant Tesla, which is refusing to sign a collective agreement on wages, shows a conflict between Swedish and American cultures, the head of the union that launched the movement said on Thursday.
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The strike initially involved 130 Tesla mechanics in 10 workshops across Sweden, which began on October 27, before escalating into conflict between unions in several sectors and the electric vehicle maker.
The movement was launched by the metal workers’ union IF Metall and subsequently nine other unions announced “solidarity measures”, including port workers and postal workers.
According to Marie Nilsson, president of IF Metall, the conflict was due to the failure of negotiations on a collective agreement on wages.
“We tried to negotiate a collective agreement with them for several years, but they refused,” she told AFP.
Collective agreements negotiated on a sector-by-sector basis form the basis of the Swedish labor market model. They cover almost 90% of all Swedish workers and guarantee them minimum wages and working conditions.
Despite being unionized, Tesla workers do not benefit from industry-specific collective bargaining agreements because their company has not signed the collective bargaining agreement applicable to their sector.
Tesla boss Elon Musk has consistently rejected calls for his 127,000 employees worldwide to unionize.
“I think it’s kind of a conflict between Swedish or European culture and the American way of doing business,” Ms. Nilsson said.
On November 20, postal workers joined the movement and refused to deliver mail and packages to Tesla workshops and offices.
Since license plates are only delivered by mail, this blockage could potentially prevent new Teslas from circulating, an assumption Musk described as “crazy.”
Tesla has taken legal action against the Swedish Transport Authority and the postal company Postnord, owned by the Swedish and Danish states, to force them to hand over license plates and mail.
The traffic authority said on Monday that a preliminary court decision had required it to have Tesla collect its license plates directly from the license plate manufacturer.