Maintenance workers at Oshawa’s GM plant ratify new deal

Maintenance workers with the Robinson Solutions Maintenance unit at the General Motors plant in Oshawa ratified a new agreement last week that gives them a raise of nearly 10 per cent, including a five per cent ‘market adjustment.’

The 60 or so members of the unit, represented by Unifor Local 222, perform skilled and semi-skilled duties at the plant.

“We made sure that our skilled trades workers had an hourly wage that reflected the global competitiveness of the skilled trades market,” said Local 222 President Jeff Gray. “These skilled workers deserve to be paid what they are worth. We are very proud that the goal was achieved. As the expression says, skilled labour isn’t cheap and cheap labour isn’t skilled.”

Gray said the biggest gain was a 4.81 per cent first year raise with a 5 per cent market adjustment for year one, making the overall wage hike 9.81 per cent. The three-year deal began March 1 and expires March 1, 2026 and was ratified by 84 per cent of the workers.