A Chrysler worker caught drinking on the job. Image courtesy of WJBK via AutoBlog.com.
Nine Chrysler workers have been suspended – and could eventually be fired – after being captured by a Detroit TV news camera drinking and smoking pot both before work and then while on their lunch breaks.
It’s the second time in less than a year a sting revealed Chrysler workers becoming intoxicated while they were supposed to be on the job.
While the incident could prove embarrassing to the automaker, which has been struggling to rebuild its reputation for quality, it also reflects more positively on the change in culture at the automaker, as the video sting was set up after the Detroit Fox affiliate received a tip from two workers at the suburban Detroit engine plant who said they were worried drug and alcohol use could threaten their safety.
A number of Chrysler plants have, over the years, struggled with problems involving drugs and alcohol. A senior union official acknowledged to TheDetroitBureau.com that the maker’s Windsor minivan plant was often referred to as “The Zoo,” with extensive use of alcohol and drugs, often on the plant’s roof. The Canadian Auto Workers union official insisted, however, that labor and management had made an aggressive push to correct the problem.
That’s the same position taken by the company and officials from the United Auto Workers Union on the U.S. side of the border. But privately, officials admit there are still problems to be dealt with.
The latest incident occurred at the Trenton Engine Plant, on the south side of Detroit. After studying the video provided by TV station WJBK, the automaker moved to suspend the nine workers. The case will now be reviewed by company authorities and by the union and it is possible the workers will be fired.
In years past, the UAW often moved to block such disciplinary action but is less likely to do so, sources suggest, though the union might seek alternative punishment or a diversion to a treatment program.
The previous incident caught on video occurred last autumn when the same TV station videotaped workers using pot and alcohol outside the Jefferson Avenue North Plant, in Detroit. Two were fired but two others were given a one-month unpaid leave.
Change in culture? WTF? No way!
Sadly, Tater, for once I can’t come up with a reasonable argument.
I DO believe that the union management know this doesn’t fly anymore, so I will be curious to see what happens when they step in. The fact that several of the workers were fired last autumn was a good sign. Let’s see what happens. If they get off, this time, with little punishment it would not send the right signal, that’s for sure.
Paul A. Eisenstein
Publisher, TheDetroitBureau.com
To be honest with you Paul, I was a committeeman for the UAW for 18 years, bargaining committe also. (GM) I’ve seen this, smelled it and defended these jerks. Alcohol we could bring them back. Drugs……..Yokich said…….gone! Don’t send me the case! What has turned us retirees off with the UAW is the fact that they get either of “The Poverty Pimps”, Al Sharpton or Jesse Jackson to stand in front of the podium with the UAW seal in front of them. That really turns off the retirees. We don’t want, need or even to see either of these losers doing the talking for any UAW member. There are so many people out there looking for a job and these jerks are doing this! No respect for themselves or their families and the members of the UAW who do walk a straight line for a job that is hard to find!
Hi, Tater,
I don’t have a problem with what people do at home…within reason…but I fully agree with you about the nonsense of allowing this sort of behavior on the line. My former brother-in-law was a union guy who got promoted to low-level management at the old Sterling Heights Stamping Plant and I just recall with horror some of the stories he would tell. He was a ridiculously hard worker and I think that’s why he took the bump to a management job because he knew how poorly some (NOT all) his union colleagues were performing back then. He’s been retired more than a decade and as I have come to believe at MANY plants, a lot of the newer union managers are not so tolerant of this nonsense anymore. I think that the near-death experience helped get the message across and I believe that Gettelfinger and, now, King, don’t have patience for it, either.
What I think should be seen as promising is that the losers (OK…alleged losers, as they have not been formally and officially fired) were outed by fellow line workers.
As for Sharpton, I have never had use for him for a variety of reasons that get us way off base here. Mixed feelings about the Rev. Jesse. Oddly, when I went to Chrysler for a labor talk backgrounder, recently, I got my ID badge and turned around to let the next guy get his. It was Jackson. I’d covered him as a journalist, decades ago, but never met him before.
BTW, do you believe that such abuse problems only plague Big Three plants and unions? I don’t buy that. I DO think the UAW has traditionally made it difficult to get rid of bad apples, so I am hoping to see them really crack down now.
Paul E.
As a GM/UAW retiree, I too saw this movie too many times, and agree that it is long past time to crack down on these jerks. Not to hold myself up as the ideal employee, but in thirty years I was late, always excused, less than a handful of times, never had an unexcused absence and certainly never took drugs or was drunk on the job, or for that matter even took a drink before or during working hours. It just infuriated me when I got stuck working with a bunch of people that did these things, because supervisors always went to the weakest link, me, and put the work that these jerks were supposed to be doing onto me, and yes, I tolerated it, because the work had to get done. Then these same jerks would come up to me later and say, “Man, why didn’t you just tell the boss no! I wouldn’t have done it!” No doubt that was true, and then somebody else would have got stuck working extra hard, but these ne’er-do-wells didn’t care. And I’d like to say that most of the people I worked with over the years were honest, hard-working people who did what they were supposed to do, but a few bad actors gave all of us a bad reputation, and the union, in their naive approach that we were all brothers and sisters of the movement, decided that it was easier to protect the few in the name of protecting everybody. I’m a union guy now and forever, but this was certainly a weakness of the old system, and I hope the union finally draws a line in the sand and makes an example of these guys for all to see.
One question: I’m not from Detroit, but on the internet site that I watched it showed workers going in and out of turnstiles. Where I worked, you had to clock in and out at the turnstiles, and we were only given thirty minutes out of the plant at lunchtime (certainly long enough to have a couple of drinks and a smoke), but still it seems to me that these guys had found a way to stay out perhaps a bit longer, by the time they had went to their cars, drove to the parking lot and then did their thing, and then made it back to the plant. Where was management and plant protection in all of this? Weren’t they paying attention? We would have raised all sort of red flags with behavior like this at my plant. I know that management used to keep some drunks and druggies in their back pocket in case they needed to force the union to negotiate away some grievances in the past. Could it be that Chrysler was doing the same thing with these creeps, and then had their plans spoiled when the whistleblowers and Fox came into the picture? Not to say that these guys should be defended in any case, but I always felt there was a reason management put up with anybody doing this kind of stuff back when I worked, and I know that an awful lot of legitimate grievances hit the wastebasket back in my day.
r123t………..right on with your statement! As a committeeman, management “wanted” (to some degree), the alcohol induced employees for this very reason. Penalties! It made their jobs easier for good grievance vs. bad grievance exchange and also put a feather in the Labor Relations’s rep’s hat! Druggies…………gone!
Yes, I read a lot of comments (I should leave them alone, but I am addicted) on the Detroit Free Press and other sites about how evil we union guys were, and it sometimes it really hurts, because I don’t think anyone on the outside will ever realize the dynamics of the factory floor. As many eagerly point out, it wasn’t always pretty on our side, but the majority of folks just wanted to do their job and then go home. We had ne’er-d-wells, but we also had lay preachers, Little league coaches, and community volunteers. Management had a lot of good folks too, but they also had their share of problem children. Bottom line, though, is our UAW needs to police its own, even if it is a relative few, and then we can deal with management a whole lot better, to say nothing of John Q. Public. Have a nice day, Tater, and thanks to Paul for his wonderful columns and providing a nice forum.
Thanks, as well, for the insightful comments. We always appreciate the feedback.
Paul E.