Boeing workers strike for better contract

SAN FRANCISCO, Sept. 13 (Xinhua) — More than 30,000 Boeing workers went on strike Friday morning after overwhelmingly rejecting a tentative agreement between Boeing and the International Association of Machinists and Aerospace Workers.

Boeing workers approved the strike with 96 percent of the vote, well above the two-thirds vote needed for a work stoppage.

IAM District 751 President Jon Holden announced the results of the vote and confirmed the “unfair labor practices strike” that began at midnight at a news conference Thursday, adding that workers at the plant had been subjected to “discriminatory conduct, coercive interrogations, illegal surveillance and we were given illegal promises of benefits.”

“The message was clear: The tentative agreement we reached with IAM leadership was not acceptable to the membership,” Boeing said in a statement. “We remain committed to rebuilding our relationships with our employees and the union, and we are prepared to return to the bargaining table to reach a new agreement.”

Stephanie Pope, CEO of Boeing’s commercial airplanes division, said earlier this week that the tentative deal was the “best contract we’ve ever put forward.”

The tentative proposal included 25 percent wage increases and other improvements to health care and retirement benefits, while the union had asked for increases of about 40 percent.

The strike dealt a major blow to the company, which had been struggling to restart production and restore its reputation after safety crises. The work stoppage halts production of most of the company’s aircraft.

Boeing’s production has fallen short of expectations as the company works to address manufacturing defects and faces other industry-wide issues, such as supply and labor shortages.

Boeing employees already went on strike in 2008 for almost two months.

The bursting of a door plug on a Boeing 737 Max 9 recently delivered to Alaska Airlines in January of this year brought federal attention to Boeing’s production.

“Our aggressive oversight of Boeing continues,” the Federal Aviation Administration (FAA) said in a statement released Friday.