Nearly 9,000 Kentucky Truck Plant workers in Louisville are on strike. Here’s why
LOUISVILLE, Ky. (WTVQ) — Workers at kentucky’s “ford truck plant” have joined the united auto workers strike.
The surprise strike — ordering thousands of workers off the job at the company’s largest plant last night.
The walk-off from the Kentucky Truck Plant comes after negotiations between the United Auto Workers and Ford failed to come to a compromise on a new contract.
KTP produces the large F-series pick up trucks including Super Duty and the F-250.
Ford Motor Company needs to come to the table and give back what they took from us in 2008. They took our concessions, we gave them our cost of living, we gave it back. We gave our raises up. We gave our, our pensions, we, we didn’t get raises. I mean, we gave so much away that they forgot about us in all these years,” bargaining representative David Firkins.
The UAW is picketing against three major companies Ford, General Motors, and Stellantis.
The union has expanded the Stand Up Strike to more facilities in more states, it is asking for a near 40% pay hike in a new contract among other things.
“We’re out here to fight for a fair day’s work for a fair day’s pay. We want our cost of living back. We want insurance for everybody. When they retire, Jim Farley, Bill Ford make over $20 million a year out of the labor of the backs of the people inside this plant. So, what we’re asking for is a small piece of the pie. We wanna make sure our brothers and sisters over at the local assembly plant have a secure future,” said David Firkins.
Those picketing say they will strike until an agreement is reached even if there is no set timeline.
“Yeah, we certainly will. And, I’m ready to roll. I’m selling some things just to do. A video game collection of stuff. And Ford would be pretty upset to realize how long I could go. And I think there’s a lot of people here that could go pretty long. But I think if they were smart, they get this thing rolling,” said picketer Nicholas Kowalda.
On Wednesday Ford called the decision by the UAW to strike, grossly irresponsible.
And on Thursday, Ford explained how the strike will affect suppliers in the long run during a phone briefing.
“With this strike at Kentucky Truck plant in the US alone, over 600 part supplier locations and thousands of supplier jobs support Kentucky Truck Plant. We’re hearing from our suppliers as they evaluate the restart process that it will take up to four plus weeks to achieve our full production rates,” said those with Ford.
Meantime, those picketing will still be getting paid, but, “permanent hourly employees at Kentucky truck earn the top wage rate of $32 an hour and so for most of our employees on strike or on strike induced layoffs, they go from earning approximately $1500 per week on average to $500 a week in strike pay,” added those Ford.
“So we still have right now for it is not cut off our medical and if they do the union will pick it up, so we’re not going to go without health care. But it’s not the money that we’re missing right now it’s the money that we want to move forward in the future,” said Firkins.
The Kentucky House Democratic Caucus issuing a statement in support of those on strike.
“The Kentucky House Democratic Caucus is proud to support Louisville’s Kentucky Truck Plant workers now that they have joined their fellow UAW members in striking on behalf of fairer wages and job protections. These men and women sacrificed a lot to make Ford’s – and the overall auto industry’s – current success possible, and they deserve not just their fair share of that growth now, but assurances that they will continue to have a strong voice as the industry moves more toward alternative-fuel vehicles.” – Joint Statement from the Kentucky House Democratic Caucus
