Oshawa’s GM plant was shuttered in 2019. Photo: Google Maps.
November 2020
With the surprise announcement that General Motors will be re-opening their assembly plant in Oshawa in 2021, a big round of applause must go to Unifor president Jerry Dias. It appears he pulled off a miracle.
When the plant closed in December 2019, it appeared that GM was leaving Oshawa for good, after over a century of manufacturing in the city. Some could argue that the plant had been suffering a slow death for years. At the time of closure, 2,300 workers were employed at the plant, down from a peak of over 20,000 workers in the 1980s. Regardless, like a dog on a bone, Dias never gave up, insisting at the time that he could get GM to reverse its decision to close the plant there.
While Dias can be a real a**hole at times, and he seldom says anything nice about conservatives, I think a quote from Don Henley, taking about Eagles manager Irving Azoff, is appropriate at this time: “He may be Satan, but he’s our Satan.” Congratulations Jerry!
P.S. Say something nice about conservatives once in a while.
Sources: https://financialpost.com/transportation/autos/gm-to-reopen-oshawa-plant-to-make-trucks-under-tentative-union-agreement, https://www.wsws.org/en/articles/2019/12/18/osha-d18.html.
