Despite media reports to the contrary, the president of Unifor Local 200 said Ford Canada is not eliminating the third shift at the Essex Engine Plant and is just scaling back production.
John D'Agnolo told BlackburnNews.com on Friday that some workers on the motor line will be impacted by changes being made at the Essex plant, but there will be no jobs lost as a result. Instead, those workers will be given the opportunity to work at either the Annex or the Windsor Engine Plant, starting in October.
While some reports have stated that around 120 workers could be affected, D'Agnolo said it's most likely less.
"They haven't given us the exact numbers as far as who is going to be staying on that motor line, so until I have that, I can't answer that," he said.
Demand for the 5.0-litre engine for the Ford F-series pickup trucks has softened, and D'Agnolo blames that on greater consumer choice.
"At one time we have the 4.6 and the 5.4-litre engine that went into the F-150," he said. "Now we have the 5.0-litre engine that we build at Essex Engine Plant. We have the 3.5. We have the 2.7. We have the diesel engine, so there's a lot bigger mix that they can choose from."
The move to scale back production on the 5.0-litre engine was not unexpected, said D'Agnolo.
"They were going to be down the whole month of July. They had two weeks in September, and we've had down days in the schedule for most of the year," he explained.
On Thursday night, Windsor West MP Brian Masse, Windsor-Tecumseh MP Cheryl Hardcastle, and Essex MP Tracey Ramsey responded to the news reported by Crain's Automotive News calling it "appalling".
"The neglect of the auto sector by the Trudeau Liberal government is appalling," wrote Hardcastle in the joint statement. "The fallout continues to take its toll on the families in our city."
Thursday's report came out just over a month after Fiat Chrysler Automobiles announced it was eliminating the third shift at the Windsor Assembly Plant.
A spokesperson in Minister of Innovation, Science and Economic Development, Navdeep Bains' office responded, "we have spoken with Ford and Unifor to discuss the shifting of employees between the Windsor plants, and were assured any impacted employees would be offered a job on the new line. We remain committed to supporting our autoworkers, which is why we have been investing in companies like Ford. Our investment in March 2017 was directly responsible for keeping Windsor Engine [Plant] open."
