Krugerrand
Meow
Yes, I believe you are correct, which seems strange to me. You don’t mess with the mail in many countries. It’s sacred, it’s a serious federal offense. But apparently in Sweden you can with abandonment and aplomb.
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Tesla Unionization
- Thread starter Buckminster
- Start date
Yes, worse than the countries used to be called third world countries two decades ago.
Krugerrand
Meow
I believe Sweden would like us to think they’re extraordinarily progressive, at least where their labor unions and labor laws stand.
Is this really following "the principle of proportionality" in EU law? for example,
- The measure must be necessary to achieve the aim, that there cannot be any less onerous way of doing it.
- The measure must be necessary to achieve the aim, that there cannot be any less onerous way of doing it.
I believe it is criminal for Union Thugs to conspire to put a company out of business if they do not unionize their employees.
If their Government does not step in to protect the legal rights of Tesla to choose to be non-union, then Tesla should pull out completely.
Other non-mandatory union Nations should sanction the importation of Swedish products into their countrys, and refuse to export any items to that country as well.
Unions have no right to coerce non union plants. Both have the right to exist.
If their Government does not step in to protect the legal rights of Tesla to choose to be non-union, then Tesla should pull out completely.
Other non-mandatory union Nations should sanction the importation of Swedish products into their countrys, and refuse to export any items to that country as well.
Unions have no right to coerce non union plants. Both have the right to exist.
2daMoon
Mostly Harmless
That is really a last resort.
In the mean time, Tesla can sit on it hands, find workable solutions and keep increasing the presence of Tesla products in Sweden.
Eventually, having IF Metall jacking with the company over these union trifles will be weighed against the effect upon Sweden after the decision makers are all driving Tesla cars, using Powerwalls and Megapacks to supplement their grid, and see how much more Tesla (without signing an agreement) offers Sweden, without compromising any of the standards the union claims to hold dear for the workers.
At that point, if the problem still persists to the point that the Swedish government actually do pass actual laws to force Tesla to leave, so be it.
Time will tell.
Krugerrand
Meow
Clarification. This isn’t about unionization of employees. Tesla Sweden already has both unionized and non-unionized employees.
This is about Tesla not signing a collective agreement with an industry union.
Certainly one option is for Tesla to not do business in Sweden. I can guarantee that that is the last thing on Tesla’s list to do, if it even exists on the list of options at all, which I doubt it does.
Tesla will fight the way Tesla always fights; for what it believes to be right and proper. They will get creative, they will fight in courts when necessary, and they will bend the will of those opposed just like they’ve done in the US, in China and eventually in India and Sweden, etc…
Where there is a will, there is a way, and Tesla has the will of Elon Musk who never gives up, even while staring into the abyss or traveling through the 9 rings of hell. Sweden doesn’t even register on the scale of difficult.
I would bet my own money that Tesla does not pack up its toys in Sweden.
We’re a long way from something that drastic.
Agreed. The problem here for the union is that their relevancy to exist is at stake. They’ve admitted as much.
Whenever someone or something’s existence is threatened, the instinct is to fight. Unfortunately, the union chose the wrong opponent to fight this time. They’d have been much wiser to reevaluate their business practices and then revamped them based on what Tesla found objectionable.
No, my Swedish friends, doing so wouldn’t have been bending to the will of Tesla, it would have been understanding the changing times, understanding what new, innovative, agile, creative companies require, understanding how to stay relevant and necessary moving into a brave, new era of business.
Tesla and the like will dominate, are dominating, the landscape. Get with the times or die.
IF Metall has decided to die. So be it.
20 people lost their jobs because of sympathy actions:
This is amazing insight from the Union, the last part says it all:
arbetet.se
Two months. That's how long the strike among Tesla employees IF Metall members has been going on. The goal is a collective agreement, but the union's contract secretary Veli-Pekka Säikkälä does not want to reveal how things are going with that.
- We have talked to each other. We meet sometimes and we talk on the phone sometimes. Quite natural as the conflict has been going on for two months. The only way to solve this is to talk to each other.
Veli-Pekka Säikkälä does not say when the parties have been in contact. He is also careful to emphasize that there are no negotiations underway.
Why is it so important to emphasize? What exactly is the difference between talking and negotiating?
- The reason I say that is because we are discussing, it is not what you would call regular negotiation.
You have been involved in many conversations and negotiations. Your long experience should mean that you still have some sense of what is possible, right?
- Yes I have. But I'm not going to tell you that. It would be very stupid to do it in the mass media so the other party could read it.
Will you have to work a lot over Christmas on this question?
- I do not know. There are a lot of journalists calling. But I'm not going to tell you when we'll meet next time and stuff like that.
But is it common practice in conversations like this to take a short Christmas break?
- You can never take breaks when you have a labor market conflict. Then you are on standby. There is something serious going on out there. There are people who go on strike, people who are in blockade, there are companies that lose a lot of money. There is no such thing as "now it's Christmas, now you're free".
Veli-Pekka Säikkälä thinks that volunteering is misunderstood.
Of course, it is voluntary to sign a collective agreement. But at the same time, you gain a lot from it, he notes. The parties in the labor market avoid legislation around conditions and a more unstable labor market with more strikes. Employers are given a duty of peace. And at the same time - if you do not have a collective agreement, it is included that the union, under the right conditions, can strike to try to reach an agreement.
- It is also voluntary to get vaccinated. If you do, you may still get sick, but less so. In the same way, if you sign a collective agreement, you will not be exposed to conflict measures, except for the milder sympathy measures.
Is the entire Swedish model at stake because of this?
- If Tesla does not have to have a collective agreement, others will question why they should have it. If they can go to the side, they will have a competitive situation that makes it more beneficial for them than for Bilia and Hedin's car.
So there we have it. The union's actions are like a disease and the collective agreement is a vaccine against it. And it a competitive advantage to not have collective agreement.
Samtal mellan IF Metall och Tesla – ”Det är något allvarligt som händer”
De pratar med varandra – men IF Metalls avtalssekreterare Veli-Pekka Säikkälä vill inte kalla det förhandlingar.
arbetet.se
Conversation between IF Metall and Tesla - "Something serious is happening"
They talk to each other - but IF Metall's contract secretary Veli-Pekka Säikkälä does not want to call it negotiations.Two months. That's how long the strike among Tesla employees IF Metall members has been going on. The goal is a collective agreement, but the union's contract secretary Veli-Pekka Säikkälä does not want to reveal how things are going with that.
- We have talked to each other. We meet sometimes and we talk on the phone sometimes. Quite natural as the conflict has been going on for two months. The only way to solve this is to talk to each other.
Veli-Pekka Säikkälä does not say when the parties have been in contact. He is also careful to emphasize that there are no negotiations underway.
Why is it so important to emphasize? What exactly is the difference between talking and negotiating?
- The reason I say that is because we are discussing, it is not what you would call regular negotiation.
"Good tone"
Nothing more can be gained from Sweden's currently most attention-grabbing labor market conflict. Well, one thing - that there is a good tone.You have been involved in many conversations and negotiations. Your long experience should mean that you still have some sense of what is possible, right?
- Yes I have. But I'm not going to tell you that. It would be very stupid to do it in the mass media so the other party could read it.
Will you have to work a lot over Christmas on this question?
- I do not know. There are a lot of journalists calling. But I'm not going to tell you when we'll meet next time and stuff like that.
But is it common practice in conversations like this to take a short Christmas break?
- You can never take breaks when you have a labor market conflict. Then you are on standby. There is something serious going on out there. There are people who go on strike, people who are in blockade, there are companies that lose a lot of money. There is no such thing as "now it's Christmas, now you're free".
Misunderstood voluntariness
Films portraying IF Metall as mafia bosses are currently being spread in social media. Where collective agreements are completely voluntary but where it still goes to hell if the company says no to it.Veli-Pekka Säikkälä thinks that volunteering is misunderstood.
Of course, it is voluntary to sign a collective agreement. But at the same time, you gain a lot from it, he notes. The parties in the labor market avoid legislation around conditions and a more unstable labor market with more strikes. Employers are given a duty of peace. And at the same time - if you do not have a collective agreement, it is included that the union, under the right conditions, can strike to try to reach an agreement.
- It is also voluntary to get vaccinated. If you do, you may still get sick, but less so. In the same way, if you sign a collective agreement, you will not be exposed to conflict measures, except for the milder sympathy measures.
Is the entire Swedish model at stake because of this?
- If Tesla does not have to have a collective agreement, others will question why they should have it. If they can go to the side, they will have a competitive situation that makes it more beneficial for them than for Bilia and Hedin's car.
So there we have it. The union's actions are like a disease and the collective agreement is a vaccine against it. And it a competitive advantage to not have collective agreement.
Krugerrand
Meow
Misunderstood voluntariness!?This is amazing insight from the Union, the last part says it all:
Samtal mellan IF Metall och Tesla – ”Det är något allvarligt som händer”
De pratar med varandra – men IF Metalls avtalssekreterare Veli-Pekka Säikkälä vill inte kalla det förhandlingar.Conversation between IF Metall and Tesla - "Something serious is happening"
They talk to each other - but IF Metall's contract secretary Veli-Pekka Säikkälä does not want to call it negotiations.
Two months. That's how long the strike among Tesla employees IF Metall members has been going on. The goal is a collective agreement, but the union's contract secretary Veli-Pekka Säikkälä does not want to reveal how things are going with that.
- We have talked to each other. We meet sometimes and we talk on the phone sometimes. Quite natural as the conflict has been going on for two months. The only way to solve this is to talk to each other.
Veli-Pekka Säikkälä does not say when the parties have been in contact. He is also careful to emphasize that there are no negotiations underway.
Why is it so important to emphasize? What exactly is the difference between talking and negotiating?
- The reason I say that is because we are discussing, it is not what you would call regular negotiation.
"Good tone"
Nothing more can be gained from Sweden's currently most attention-grabbing labor market conflict. Well, one thing - that there is a good tone.
You have been involved in many conversations and negotiations. Your long experience should mean that you still have some sense of what is possible, right?
- Yes I have. But I'm not going to tell you that. It would be very stupid to do it in the mass media so the other party could read it.
Will you have to work a lot over Christmas on this question?
- I do not know. There are a lot of journalists calling. But I'm not going to tell you when we'll meet next time and stuff like that.
But is it common practice in conversations like this to take a short Christmas break?
- You can never take breaks when you have a labor market conflict. Then you are on standby. There is something serious going on out there. There are people who go on strike, people who are in blockade, there are companies that lose a lot of money. There is no such thing as "now it's Christmas, now you're free".
Misunderstood voluntariness
Films portraying IF Metall as mafia bosses are currently being spread in social media. Where collective agreements are completely voluntary but where it still goes to hell if the company says no to it.
Veli-Pekka Säikkälä thinks that volunteering is misunderstood.
Of course, it is voluntary to sign a collective agreement. But at the same time, you gain a lot from it, he notes. The parties in the labor market avoid legislation around conditions and a more unstable labor market with more strikes. Employers are given a duty of peace. And at the same time - if you do not have a collective agreement, it is included that the union, under the right conditions, can strike to try to reach an agreement.
- It is also voluntary to get vaccinated. If you do, you may still get sick, but less so. In the same way, if you sign a collective agreement, you will not be exposed to conflict measures, except for the milder sympathy measures.
Is the entire Swedish model at stake because of this?
- If Tesla does not have to have a collective agreement, others will question why they should have it. If they can go to the side, they will have a competitive situation that makes it more beneficial for them than for Bilia and Hedin's car.
So there we have it. The union's actions are like a disease and the collective agreement is a vaccine against it. And it a competitive advantage to not have collective agreement.
Done, given, or acting from one’s own ‘free will’.
You know what isn’t voluntary in Sweden? Sympathy striking. So while Tesla can voluntarily not sign a collective agreement, any union member in all of Sweden connected to IF Metall by a nose hair has to put their job on the line and strike if the union says so.
Seems pretty easy to understand to me.
Time for a voluntary poll about whether or not having that little tidbit hanging over your Swedish employment head seems like a good idea. Let’s start with the 20 innocent workers that are now out of job.
adiggs
Well-Known Member
I've just assumed that the Nordic countries as a whole (and therefore Sweden) were at least as militant about privacy and other democratic principles as the US, and mostly a lot so.
Postnord refusing to deliver mail to some customers and not others implies the capability to monitor mail, sender and receiver, and act on that information. This being upheld would freak me out if I lived there. This establishes the precedent that the union can call for an end to to anybody, any time. It would just be a steady drop of progressively more and larger restrictions, and the judicial systems is now on record with a decision and support of that decision on appeal. At least its not at the direction of the government! Actually I'm not sure whether a private entity filtering the mail, or the government filtering the mail, would freak me out more.
Last I'd read Postnord was not only refusing to deliver, was also refusing to hand the mail over. That sure sounds like stealing mail - maybe that's not a felony in Sweden. In the US interfering and stealing US mail is most definitely a crime.
That the justice system is standing by and supporting the private entity compelling the mail service to filter the mail - that's a combination of words put together into a sentence that I struggle to make sense of.
Unless I just view the Swedish government as the enforcement arm of IF Metall, and IF Metall as the local mafia. I know that I have no personal experience with Swedish culture and norms, so I undoubtedly don't understand.
Cliffs: Tesla asked to get the pick up their email while they waited for the court to decide if Postnord should be forced to give it to them or not. This was denied. Instead the court will have to settle the question first, which will happen next.
This was a temporary solution, instead the permanent solution will be debated in court.
So more Swedes have lost their jobs at non-Tesla factories (~20) than are striking at Tesla (~13)!
Krugerrand
Meow
That is correct! Strike working exactly as planned.
A thought just occurred to me. Tesla should hire those people who just lost their jobs.
adiggs
Well-Known Member
With friends like this, who needs enemies?
2daMoon
Mostly Harmless
FTF-IF Metall
Aren't we still waiting to hear from IF Metall to answer the most basic question of, "What benefits would be the result for any business saddled with a collective agreement?"
Surely, with all the good they've done for the Swedish workers it should be easy to show how:
- production has improved,
- the pay has increased,
- morale has improved,
- a strong employee-employer relationship is nurtured,
- agile methods for constant improvement are encouraged,
- before/after metrics clearly demonstrate consistent growth and improvement to the business after adopting the union model.
IF Metall's answer for queries about any proof of a long-term benefit to those businesses afflicted with their union will likely continue to be a symphony of
What incentive do you see for either party to give up on their own? As long as the strike costs both parties almost nothing in economic terms, it really comes down to perception or PR.
If Tesla went on the offensive (however that would look) I could see some pressure on IF Metall, but they seem to believe this is bigger than Tesla and almost an existential crisis.
