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In Sweden, a protracted labor dispute sees 70 car mechanics continuing their standoff with Tesla, one of the world’s most valuable companies. The strike, affecting the automaker’s 10 Swedish service centers, has entered its second year with no resolution in sight.
Janis Kuzma has maintained a presence on the Tesla picket line since October 2023, marking a sustained commitment to the labor action.
“It’s a tough time,” the 39-year-old Kuzma states, acknowledging the challenges of the ongoing strike, which are likely to intensify with the onset of Sweden’s harsh winter.
Kuzma spends each Monday with a colleague outside a Tesla garage in an industrial park in Malmö. Their union, IF Metall, provides support in the form of a mobile builders’ van for accommodation, as well as provisions like coffee and sandwiches.
However, operations appear to continue unabated at the workshop across the road, seemingly unaffected by the strike.
At the heart of the strike is a fundamental issue in Swedish industrial relations: the right of trade unions to collectively bargain for their members’ pay and working conditions. This principle of collective agreement has been a cornerstone of Swedish industrial relations for nearly a century.
Currently, approximately 70% of Swedish workers are trade union members, and 90% are covered by collective agreements. Strikes, in this context, are relatively uncommon.
The established system is generally well-regarded. “We prefer the right to negotiate freely with the unions and sign collective agreements,” affirms Mattias Dahl of the Confederation of Swedish Enterprise, a prominent business organization.
However, Tesla’s stance has disrupted this equilibrium. Elon Musk, the company’s CEO, has openly expressed his “disagreement” with the concept of unions. “I just don’t like anything which creates a kind of lords and peasants sort of thing,” he stated at an event in New York in 2023, adding, “I think the unions try to create negativity in a company.”
Since entering the Swedish market in 2014, IF Metall has sought to establish a collective agreement with Tesla.
“But they wouldn’t respond,” says Marie Nilsson, the union’s president. “And we got the impression that they tried to hide away or not discuss this with us.”
Nilsson explains that the union ultimately felt compelled to initiate a strike, commencing on October 27, 2023. “Usually it’s enough to make the threat,” she notes. “The company usually signs the agreement.”
This, however, has not been the case.
Janis Kuzma, originally from Latvia, began working for Tesla in 2021. He alleges that pay and conditions were often subject to the arbitrary decisions of managers.
He recounts a performance review where he claims he was denied an annual pay raise because he was “not reaching Tesla’s goals.” He further alleges that a colleague was refused a pay rise due to having the “wrong attitude.”
While a significant portion of the workforce joined the strike, not all employees participated. At the time of the industrial action, Tesla employed approximately 130 mechanics. IF Metall reports that roughly 70 of its members are currently on strike.
Tesla has since replaced the striking workers, a move that is unprecedented in Sweden since the 1930s.
“Tesla has done it [found replacement staff] openly and systematically,” says German Bender, a researcher at Arena Idé, a think tank funded by Swedish trade unions.
“It’s not illegal, which is important to understand. But it goes against all established norms. But Tesla doesn’t care about norms.”
“They want to be norm breakers. So if somebody tells them, hey, you are breaking a norm, they see that as a compliment.”
The BBC requested an interview with Tesla’s subsidiary, TM Sweden, but the request was declined via email, citing “all-time high deliveries.”
In fact, the company has granted only one media interview since the strike began two years ago.
In March 2024, TM Sweden’s “country lead,” Jens Stark, stated to the business publication Dagens Industri that the company found it more beneficial to forgo a collective agreement, opting instead “to work closely with the team and give them the best possible conditions.”
Stark refuted the notion that the decision to avoid a collective agreement originated from Tesla headquarters in the US. “We have a mandate to make our own such decisions,” he asserted.
IF Metall’s efforts are not without support. Several other unions have expressed solidarity with the strike.
Dockworkers in neighboring Denmark, Norway, and Finland are refusing to handle Teslas; waste collection services have been suspended at Tesla’s Swedish facilities; and newly constructed charging stations are not being connected to the power grid.
One such facility, located near Stockholm Arlanda Airport, features 20 idle chargers. However, Tibor Blomhäll, president of the Tesla Club Sweden, maintains that Tesla owners remain largely unaffected by the strike.
“There’s another charging station 10km (six miles) from here,” he points out. “And we can still buy our cars, we can service our cars, we can charge our cars.”
With considerable stakes for both sides, a resolution to the standoff appears distant. IF Metall faces the risk of establishing a potentially damaging precedent should it concede on the principle of collective agreement.
“The concern is that that would spread,” Mr. Bender cautions, “and eventually erode the strong support for the labor market model that we have among employers as well.”
Conversely, Tesla may perceive that yielding in Sweden would embolden unionization efforts at its production facilities in the US and Germany, where it employs tens of thousands of workers.
Mr. Bender identifies another factor influencing Tesla’s position. “I think it’s important to understand that Elon Musk doesn’t want to be sort of told how to do things,” he observes.
“And I think he doesn’t view the industrial action that the union has taken as an invitation to negotiate, but rather as an ultimatum to sign a dotted line that he doesn’t want to sign.”
Mr. Blomhäll of Tesla Club Sweden similarly anticipates a prolonged impasse. “This will be another Korean War,” he predicts. “A conflict that just drags on.”
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