Less than 40% of Unionists Participate in Walkout
Renault Samsung Motors said on Dec. 24 that its output had plunged by about 70 percent from the normal level since the labor union went on partial strike on Dec. 20. The carmaker’s Busan plant produced 210 units on Dec. 23, a 65 percent drop from 600 units before.
On Dec. 24, 646 of the union’s 1,727 members downed tools for the strike at the Busan factory, recording a participation rate of 37.4 percent. On Dec. 23, the first normal working day since the labor union's declaration of the partial strike, only 707 workers went on strike, a participation rate of only 41 percent. The strike momentum is on the wane, but the participation rate exceeds 30 percent, high enough to impede the automaker’s production.
The company's management has altered its work system to integrated day and night shifts and moved night shift workers to daytime production work, but the change is not enough to return the plant’s operation to the normal level.
The management is determined not to go to a negotiation table until unionists withdraw the strike. The company's labor and management have had collective wage negotiations since September but failed to iron out differences.