Fighting back helps

well the spectre that is slashing away at our working conditions is having a field day,they (that well known north american carparts company) want nothing to do with paying into the pensions,the final salary pension is not an option,they want to destroy any agreements in place for workers protection everything that has been fought for and won in the past will be given up (which in my opinion has been given up cheaply for short term gain by the unions over the past few years ilo 100 is a case in point a law to protect sweatshop workers from exploitation by companys, introduced and twisted around to work against the workforce)they are chipping away at our rates of pay shift allowences (also stealth rises from vending machines prices totaly overpriced (captive customers)and canteen food prices) hiking up the car scheme prices to the workforce whilst the powers that be getting free fuel cheaper car schemes a total disreguard of the morale of the workforce(dont worry no payback on saturdays/no 40+ hr week, yer right!) as a whole a lot of people are totaly fed up at the way they are treated by the company and kept in the dark by the unions through lack of information no matter how small it matters to us all and would leave at the drop of a hat,thats a terrible indictement of a company and a union that used to be a good company to work for and a good union with very good reps but now are just there to collect the weekly draw money sadly.job skills that are learnt over years will disapear over night with a skilled workforce,we are on the verge of loosing another part of industry in this country(uk)and other countries. will we go the same way as the ship building trade which when they came to build ships again couldn't find anyone to train the next generation,well the clocks ticking the british goverment wants commitment from gme,gme wants money before committing,brinksmanship of the highest order going on here,will gm ride in at the final hour like a knight in shinning armour to save the day and keep the uk arm and gme but make the unions take a shafting and sell their souls and the workforce down the river.please forgive them for they know not what they do or do they?
well keep your chin up and your head down they cant shoot you if you hide behind the truth cheers the factoty cat
ps.grand theft auto pension has a nice ring to it and the bit about the president top notch you think you got it bad we got gordon brown lol

Its easy being an internet warior if you have a problem with the way YOUR trade union is being run stand up and be counted yourself dont be telling the world on here do something about it

as the tumble weeds blow about the factory floor and the distant lone bell tolls,
the workers stand and await their fate as only the senior reps knows,
will they toe the union line boys or will they tell the lads,
keep them in the dark boys it's the good old union way, because if we find out the truth boys it will take their power away,
now we pay them a fair old whack for all their help and support all we want is the plain old truth thats what your supposed to report.

the unions have themselves to blame for workers apathy they have been stitching us up for years when we wanted to strike and fight they bottled it at eport''now is not the time to fight speech''from the union puppets when they were out voted they they held a ballot that was then counted by they local council and not the electoral reform society in london i for one dont think the unions in eport could even lie sraight in bed. no credibility no leadership god help us all

Nothing has been learned since the 2000 closure of the Luton and V6 engine plants.
Its time to stand up and be counted in what ever country you work in.
Magana ARE anti trade union and will try their level best to divide and rule,but hey we have had that for years.
It is time for our unions to come together and and tell these wanna be car makers that it is through our members which make them rich.
The UAW have been stitched up in the US,are we about to go the same way.
The EEF trade union side should make it crystal clear that we will not be tossed on to the scrap heap here in the UK.We have had the pain more than the others it is time to face down the on coming onslaught of men and women being thrown on to the scrap heap.
It is time to make a stand here!

They may be crying about General Motors' bankruptcy today. But dumping 40,000 of the last 60,000 union jobs into a mass grave won't spoil Jamie Dimon's day.

Dimon is the CEO of JP Morgan Chase bank. While GM workers are losing their retirement health benefits, their jobs, their life savings; while shareholders are getting zilch and many creditors getting hosed, a few privileged GM lenders – led by Morgan and Citibank – expect to get back 100% of their loans to GM, a stunning $6 billion.

The way these banks are getting their $6 billion bonanza is stone cold illegal.

I smell a rat.

Stevie the Rat, to be precise. Steven Rattner, Barack Obama's 'Car Czar' - the man who essentially ordered GM into bankruptcy this morning.

When a company goes bankrupt, everyone takes a hit: fair or not, workers lose some contract wages, stockholders get wiped out and creditors get fragments of what's left. That's the law. What workers don't lose are their pensions (including old-age health funds) already taken from their wages and held in their name.

But not this time. Stevie the Rat has a different plan for GM: grab the pension funds to pay off Morgan and Citi.

Here's the scheme: Rattner is demanding the bankruptcy court simply wipe away the money GM owes workers for their retirement health insurance. Cash in the insurance fund would be replaced by GM stock. The percentage may be 17% of GM's stock - or 25%. Whatever, 17% or 25% is worth, well ... just try paying for your dialysis with 50 shares of bankrupt auto stock.

Yet Citibank and Morgan, says Rattner, should get their whole enchilada - $6 billion right now and in cash - from a company that can't pay for auto parts or worker eye exams.

Preventive Detention for Pensions

So what's wrong with seizing workers' pension fund money in a bankruptcy? The answer, Mr. Obama, Mr. Law Professor, is that it's illegal.



In 1974, after a series of scandalous take-downs of pension and retirement funds during the Nixon era, Congress passed the Employee Retirement Income Security Act. ERISA says you can't seize workers' pension funds (whether monthly payments or health insurance) any more than you can seize their private bank accounts. And that's because they are the same thing: workers give up wages in return for retirement benefits.

The law is darn explicit that grabbing pension money is a no-no. Company executives must hold these retirement funds as "fiduciaries." Here's the law, Professor Obama, as described on the government's own web site under the heading, "Health Plans and Benefits."

"The primary responsibility of fiduciaries is to run the plan solely in the interest of participants and beneficiaries and for the exclusive purpose of providing benefits."

Every business in America that runs short of cash would love to dip into retirement kitties, but it's not their money any more than a banker can seize your account when the bank's a little short. A plan's assets are for the plan's members only, not for Mr. Dimon nor Mr. Rubin.

Yet, in effect, the Obama Administration is demanding that money for an elderly auto worker's spleen should be siphoned off to feed the TARP babies. Workers go without lung transplants so Dimon and Rubin can pimp out their ride. This is another "Guantanamo" moment for the Obama Administration - channeling Nixon to endorse the preventive detention of retiree health insurance.

Filching GM's pension assets doesn't become legal because the cash due the fund is replaced with GM stock. Congress saw through that switch-a-roo by requiring that companies, as fiduciaries, must

"...act prudently and must diversify the plan's investments in order to minimize the risk of large losses."

By "diversify" for safety, the law does not mean put 100% of worker funds into a single busted company's stock.

This is dangerous business: The Rattner plan opens the floodgate to every politically-connected or down-on-their-luck company seeking to drain health care retirement funds.



House of Rubin

Pensions are wiped away and two connected banks don't even get a haircut? How come Citi and Morgan aren't asked, like workers and other creditors, to take stock in GM?

As Butch said to Sundance, who ARE these guys? You remember Morgan and Citi. These are the corporate Welfare Queens who've already sucked up over a third of a trillion dollars in aid from the US Treasury and Federal Reserve. Not coincidentally, Citi, the big winner, has paid over $100 million to Robert Rubin, the former US Treasury Secretary. Rubin was Obama's point-man in winning banks' endorsement and campaign donations (by far, his largest source of his corporate funding).

With GM's last dying dimes about to fall into one pocket, and the Obama Treasury in his other pocket, Morgan's Jamie Dimon is correct in saying that the last twelve months will prove to be the bank's "finest year ever."

Which leaves us to ask the question: is the forced bankruptcy of GM, the elimination of tens of thousands of jobs, just a collection action for favored financiers?

And it's been a good year for Señor Rattner. While the Obama Administration made a big deal out of Rattner's youth spent working for the Steelworkers Union, they tried to sweep under the chassis that Rattner was one of the privileged, select group of investors in Cerberus Capital, the owners of Chrysler. "Owning" is a loose term. Cerberus "owned" Chrysler the way a cannibal "hosts" you for dinner. Cerberus paid nothing for Chrysler - indeed, they were paid billions by Germany's Daimler Corporation to haul it away. Cerberus kept the cash, then dumped Chrysler's bankrupt corpse on the US taxpayer.

("Cerberus," by the way, named itself after the Roman's mythical three-headed dog guarding the gates Hell. Subtle these guys are not.)

While Stevie the Rat sold his interest in the Dog from Hell when he became Car Czar, he never relinquished his post at the shop of vultures called Quadrangle Hedge Fund. Rattner's personal net worth stands at roughly half a billion dollars. This is Obama's working class hero.

If you ran a business and played fast and loose with your workers' funds, you could land in prison. Stevie the Rat's plan is nothing less than Grand Theft Auto Pension.

It doesn't make it any less of a crime if the President drives the getaway car.

******

the hardcore stewards as u say r also the ones who supported banking hours to be repayed on saturdays.about time union got its own house in order and stop giving in on promises of jobs.stitch up is about right.stand up and fight my arse

Hey no one knew in the UK it took place!Stich up is about right!